Temporal Doom
by The Familiar
Summary: Zim finds himself stuck in the past, with no way to get out.
1. Chapter 1

Wikipedia is the source of all knowledge. Do NOT use this as source of historical accuracy.

I was going to leave this for later, but thought ANZAC day would be a good time to post it. This will have very slow updates. Lucky if one a week.

- - -- --- - --

Zim stood in the middle of a dirty tunnel. He looked about himself and identified it as a trench, a primitive defensive structure used in warfare.

He sniffed, and made a face. The smell of rotting corpses was thick in the air; Zim was glad he was a soldier, or the smell might be making him even queasier.

Zim cursed GIR for getting him into this trouble. He had finally gotten the Space-time object replacement device (from here-on known as the STORD) operating, and then the stupid robot had pushed him in! The STORD must still have been broken, or it would have just spat him back out, leaving him with a bit of a headache, but no damage to the machine. But instead it had swallowed him up and spat him out here, where ever here was.

He looked around himself and spotted a person sleeping next to one of the trench walls. 'Stupid human!' he shouted, marching over to the sleeper, 'How dare you sleep on the job?' He poked the human in the shoulder, and the human fell to the side. Zim looked down, and saw a pair of eyes staring back at him, unseeing of Zims alien appearance.

'Oh.' Zim knelt down to study the dead human. It didn't look much older than the Dib human, and the other humans that went to Skool with Zim. They were... Zim had to think about this. They were 14 or 15, still smeets by Irken standards, yet allowed to go out onto the field of combat as humans.

Zim poked the body again. Though this human was much bigger than he was, there would be no use in wasting a perfectly good disguise. He pulled off the soldier's helmet, and wiped it clean before settling it over his antennae.

Then he pulled off the others jacket, and tried to ignore the stiff part that was coated in dried human blood, surrounding a large hole. He slung the jacket on over his standard issue Irken shirt, then decided to ignore the pants. The jacket sleeves went well down his arms without him having to worry about tripping over too-long pants as well.

He searched the corpse for a gun, but couldn't find one. Either the humans couldn't even provide adequate weapons for their soldiers, or it had been taken for use by another human. Stupid humans, didn't they know Zim was going to be looking for that gun?

He gave one last glare at the dead man and the walls, then started trudging off through the trenches. He stopped occasionally, to look at hands poking through the trench walls. Some were holding cards, as grim forms of grave humour, others were missing fingers that looked to have been removed after death; Zim figured these might have had rings or other human ornaments on them.

He flinched when he heard an explosion, but judged it to be too far away to be of any concern to him, though it must have hit someone, because he could faintly hear human screams and shouts from the same direction as the explosion. He scrambled up the trench wall, using his spider legs to grip, and peered over the edge. There was barren, grey land for as far as he could see, divided up by only some ditches that he supposed were more trenches.

Zim dropped back down to the floor of the trench and sat down, leaning against the wall. He was caught in the middle of a war zone, which one he didn't know. He had been planning on learning all of Earths wars, to see how the human's defensive technology was, but got caught too up trying to melt boulders with vinegar to finish research.

He would be able to make another STORD machine, of course he would. If the humans had the supplies, and technology yet. But even if they didn't, he would be able to make another one. "With the same faults?" a niggling little voice at the back of his head said.

'Of course! I'm brilliant! I can make it again, perfectly!' He shouted as loudly as he could.

'Hello?' He heard a voice say from around the corner of the trench.

Zim stood up and backed away. Was this human going to kill him? They were in a war zone, so Zim wouldn't blame it if it did.

Around the corner came a human who was wearing the same kind of uniform as Zim, but was holding a gun in his hand. When he saw Zim he laughed. 'I knew they were desperate for more troops, but I didn't think they'd recruit soldiers that young.' He looked closer at Zim. 'You look a bit green, kid. Is this your first time in the field?'

'No! Of course not! Zim is a perfectly capable soldier!' He glared at the human for having dared suggest he was anything but perfect.

The soldier stood back a bit. This Zim fellow was very noisy. 'Have you been crying? You're eyes are very red. You don't have to worry about it though. I cried a lot when I first came here. I missed my parents so much, and my sweet little Anna. We're engaged you know.' He pulled out a tattered black and white photo, and showed it to Zim. 'She's beautiful, isn't she?'

Zim shrugged. 'Sure. Wonderful. How's the war going?'

The soldier laughed and sat down, patting at the dirt next to him, indicating Zim should sit down. 'We're out gunned, don't have enough supplies, and my feet are turning blue. So the war's going perfectly normal.' He laughed. 'But if you want my opinion, we're going to lose, and it'll all be over by the end of the year. Want a smoke?' He brought a tin of cigarettes, and offered one to Zim.

Zim picked one up and stared at it. 'Here.' The soldier lit it up, and took one for himself. 'We deserve it, being stuck out here in the middle of this Godforsaken land.' He took a puff on his cigarette. Zim watched him carefully and attempted to follow his actions. He started coughing as he sucked the poisonous air into his lungs.

The soldier laughed. 'First time? You are young.'

'Zim is-' Zim thought. They would believe him if he said he was young, rather than trying to explain away his height to the soldier. It was hard enough at Skool, with him being the only one who hadn't grown. '-very young. Yes, Zim is quite young.'

'Thought so. How'd you get into the army, anyway?'

Zim gulped. 'Ahhh, the normal way. Yes, the normal, human way of entering the armed forces.'

The soldier nodded. 'I decided I should fight for my country, and the Emperor. I'm Felix, by the way. I guess you're Zim?'

Zim nodded. 'You have heard of the amazing Zim?'

'How could I not've? You keep on shouting it out.' He finished off his cigarette and stubbed it out. 'Better get going. I'm supposed to report to the superior. Tell him the rest of my battalion's dead, and then ask for leave from this place.' He laughed again, this time without any humour. 'Of course, the only way to leave here is to get transported to a POW camp, and then who knows what'll happen to you there. They torture people, you know.'

Zim nodded. He wouldn't have expected the other side to do anything less. Of course, this side would torture people too, but they would do it for a reason. 'They killed the rest of your battalion? How?'

'Poison gas, of course. I'm glad I had my gas mask on me, or I'd be as dead as the rest of them. Poor Alfred...' He shook his head sadly.

Zim nodded and continued on next to Felix. Soldiers always died during war, that's what they were created for. The ultimate cannon fodder. But he had learnt that humans viewed the lives of soldiers differently to how Irkens viewed them. 'So, uh, how advanced are the opposing force?' Zim could still gather information from the human about the technology of the humans.

'They've already taken Passchendaele, though that's a fair way from here. We're being driven back further every day, though hopefully we might just be allowed to return home. You chose a bad tome to enter the army, kid.'

Zim was slightly confused about this. 'No, I mean their technology. What machines do they have? Giant robots, lasers, monkeys?'

'Robots? Lay-sirs? They have tanks and poison gas, plus machine guns. They also have aircraft, which drop bombs on the trenches, and land mines, but I haven't seen any of those.'

Zim nodded. 'So, primitive then.'

'Primitive!' Felix was astonished. 'Has the fatherland developed better technology, which we haven't heard of? Are they stockpiling it, for when the Britscher reach Berlin, so they can defend themselves, rather than help us out here? How could they treat us like that, those useless bureaucrats behind their desks, leaving us to die for them? Sometimes I just want to surrender.'

Zim was shocked. How dare a soldier vocalise those thoughts in the middle of a war? 'Are you a traitor, soldier? Do you dare to let _them_ over take you because you are so weak that you give up and lie down, letting them destroy your home, kill you leaders and enslave your race! And what would your An-na think if she knew you were just going to lie down and allow the Brit-scher overtake your land! You must get up and fight!'

Felix shrugged. 'Sure. I'll keep on. It probably won't do much good, but I'll continue, anyway.'

Zim grinned. 'That's the spirit. You must always continue, despite whatever odds are against you, and whatever people go against you.'

They continued on in silence. Felix mulling over his thoughts, and Zim enjoying the scenery, occasionally trying his cigarette again. Suddenly, Zim stopped. He removed his helmet and listened intently.

'What are those?' Felix asked, quite surprised. Zim looked more like a goblin than a human. He took a step backwards. He had heard that they came and ate corpses at night, but he wasn't dead yet!

'Shhhh.' Zim silenced him. 'They're coming.'

'Who are?' Felix was terrified. What could the Zim goblin creature be hearing?

'The opposing force. Get your gun and defend yourself!' Zim returned his helmet to his head and hugged the wall of the trench, and Felix followed. There was a long silence before the first of the troops came down the wall, causing Felix to shout out, and start shooting them. He wished he was back at the outpost, with it's machine gun. He managed to kill two before a bullet lodged itself into his heart, and it stopped beating.

Zim fell to the floor when the other force dropped down into the trench. Maybe they would think he was dead and leave him alone. He didn't want to get killed, or tortured. He just wanted to go back to his base. He let out a small squeak when Felix fell on him, and used the body to hide himself. If he grabbed Felixs' gun and started shooting, he would end up as dead as Felix was.

He peered out from beneath the body, and saw booted feet stomping around. One of them kicked aside Felix's body, then reached down and took his gun, his cigarette tin, and the ring he had on his finger. Zim tried to remain still as he felt another pair of hands search his coat. He pulled his hands into the sleeves and tried not to breathe. He finally let out a sign of relief when the human let him go, and the troop marched off. Though it had seemed like years for Zim, then entire thing had only lasted a few seconds.

He waited a few minutes until they had left the area, then got up, looking around slowly. IT was starting to get dark, and he couldn't hear anyone. He looked up at the trench wall, and decided to leave this place. He deployed his spider legs, and climbed up to the top of the trench.

Once at the top, Zim stopped to look around. There didn't seem to be any obstructions, and the only lights were far off in the distance. He jumped onto the top of the wall. He crouched low to the ground, and looked about, using his ocular implants. He scanned the ground for any buried metal, but couldn't spot anything so continued on, sticking close to the ground and searching the area carefully before moving on.

Halfway through the night Zim had to throw himself down to avoid being seen by some soldiers who were hiding in trenches a few metres away from him. He didn't know who these soldiers were, or where they were from, but he couldn't risk being caught by them. Who knew what they would do to him; these humans were even more primitive than the ones he knew! He didn't want to get caught and tortured, or autopsied, or forced to breed with human women! He hugged the ground until he thought the humans had gone, then got up and ran forwards, diving into the trench, and looking around. Nothing. There was nobody there. He was safe.

He leaned back against the wall, and sat down. A short rest couldn't hurt, just enough for him to lose some of the tiredness that he got from crossing the great deserted space between the trenches. He pulled the coat closer around himself and huddled into the corner. A small rest couldn't hurt. He closed his eyes, just for a short rest.

Zim was interrupted from is rest two hours later, by the sound of guns being cocked. He opened his eyes quickly and looked around rather startled. For two seconds he had no idea where he was, and just knew he had to escape. He deployed his spider legs, and sprung up above the opposite wall, hearing the guns go off as he went.

He landed badly on his spider legs, cursing at the lost speed. He threw away any attempts at concealment and just ran using the spider legs, bobbing up and down, and weaving from side to side so that the enemy couldn't get any decent shots. He jumped over about five trenches, before eventually collapsing behind a large dirt mound. He then peered behind it, checking to see that nobody was following. There were some humans off in the distance, but they were too far off to be of a current concern.

However, Zims leg was a current concern. It had been hit by a bullet when he was fleeing from the humans, and it was still lodged in his calf. He touched the hole, with a strange sense of fascination. The bullet was definitely still in there. He could feel the hard metal through his skin. He took a pair of medical tweezers from the Invader Issue First Aid Kit in his PAK, and dug around in the hole, wincing as the blood ran over his fingers. He didn't want the filthy human projectile to stay imbedded in his flesh. When he removed it he covered the injury with a bandage, and tried to stand. He grit his teeth against the pain, and sat down again. It would take a day or so for the wound to completely heal, but he could probably walk on it again in 2 hours. He looked behind himself again. He might have two hours, and he didn't want to have to keep using his spider legs. They took a fair bit of concentration, and he was more noticeable when he was using them.

He sighed and leaned back against the dirt. He could probably leave in one hour. His leg would heal as he walked. He huddled deeper into his coat, and kept watch, in case anybody showed up. There was one close call, but he pressed himself against the dirt, and stayed still, so they just ignored him as part of the dirt heap.

After an hour and a half Zim got up, limping on his bad leg, and set off in the general direction of "away from the trenches." When the sun came up, Zim looked around himself. The ground was still dirt, and there was no cover anywhere. He sighed and continued on, there would have to be somewhere to hide soon. He abhorred the thought of having to hide from the humans, but didn't want to be cut open even more, so he had to hide from them.

The ground started getting less barren the further Zim went on, and after travelling perhaps 10 kilometres more, Zim finally spotted a barn. He didn't know whose barn it was, or what side they were on. However, he did know that a barn would be good for hiding in, and that he could leave it when the sun went down again. Sneaking inside the barn, he looked around. There didn't seem to be much inside, except for a bit of straw, and a few wooden barriers. He ran inside and crouched behind one of the barriers. It would do for a hiding place, until night fell again and he could leave the barn.

-----

A farmer was herding his few remaining cows. They were all old, with visible bones and dirty hides. The farmer sighed. HIs herd used to be the envy of the entire land. He had had some of the best, fattest cattle in Europe, but now they were all dead. Either requisitioned by one army or the other, or killed by stepping on land mines, or from stray bombs. He didn't like being so close to the war zone, but couldn't leave his farm, not while he still had some cows to look after.

He herded them towards the barn where they stayed at night. It protected them from deserters and any wild animals that were still alive. He opened the barn doors, and pressed the cows to enter. They seemed frightened by something inside, and were refusing to enter. The farmer sighed. These few cows were always skittish. He entered the barn himself, to see if there was anything that might be distressing them.

He looked behind the barriers and saw a soldier in a corner, sleeping. 'German.' He spat, hatefully, slowly getting the gun he carried with him. He may be too old to fight on the frontline, but that didn't mean he couldn't kill them when they trespassed in his property.

He aimed his gun right at the head of the sleeping soldier, and started to pull the trigger...


	2. Chapter 2

Zim had been distracted out of restfulness by the sound of mooing and stomping cows outside the barn. He opened his eyes and saw light coming in from the open barn doors. Peering through the slits in the barricade he could see an old human standing near the cows, and could also see the large gun on the humans back. Subconsciously holding his still sore leg, Zim determined that he wouldn't let this human shoot him, or turn him over to the government or scientists or soldiers for experimentation.

Of course, if the human didn't notice him, he could just leave later, when it was dark and not almost dark. He got into a comfortable position in the corner, and pretended to sleep. Even if the farmer did see him, he might ignore him. He also pulled the helmet down over his face so that the farmer didn't notice his skin.

Soon, Zim heard the sound of shuffling, human footsteps coming towards him. Hunkering deeper into his coat, Zim tried to look as sleepy as possible, and not at all awake and tense.

'German.' He heard the farmer say, with a tone in his voice that Zim had only heard a few times, usually from other Irkens who then decided that it would be fun to beat Zim up. Zim tensed.

The farmer brought the gun down to point at Zim. Zim opened his PAK and brought out a laser. The farmer started to pull the trigger, and Zim sent the mental signal that would activate the laser. The farmer fell to the floor, with a large, burnt hole where his heart used to be.

Zim got up and looked down at the farmer. It seemed to be dead. He poked the old man with his toe, satisfied himself that the old human was dead, then bent down and searched the body. There were a few monies, cigarettes and matches, keys and a few cartridges for the gun. Zim picked up the monies and the keys and placed them in his PAK. The monies would come in useful, and with the keys he now had a secure hiding place.

He looked at the gun, but decided not to take it. It was a primitive human weapon, and he had far superior Irken ones in his PAK. Plus it was almost as tall as he was, and he knew the recoil would blow him off his feet if he tried to fire a shot.

He then looked at the matches, then at the dead body, then at the wooden barn filled with dry hay. The matches would be useful for getting rid of the human's body, and any evidence that could show he was there. He lit a match, then placed it on the human's body. He knew from past experience that human clothing caught fire very easily. Zim didn't know why GIR had needed the human clothes, only that he had been carrying them when Zim was soldering. The smoke had gotten everywhere!

Zim then ran out of the barn, the cows moving in front of him. Zim ignored them, and let them run off into the distance. Zim ran away from the barn, then turned and sat down. He wanted to watch it burn. He cheered when the roof collapsed, sending sparks flying into the ever darkening night.

When the last of the fire had burned itself out so that it was now boring to look at Zim moved off. He had to try and find the humans habitation, or at least the door that the keys fit. He stopped after five minutes of walking, and peered around. There was nothing nearby. He span in a circle, this time using his ocular implants to spot where landmarks in the area were. There was a small building about 2 kilometres away from where he was standing, in the opposite direction from where he had been walking.

Zim sighed and started walking towards the building, hoping it was the human's house, or at least someplace where he could shelter. It had been cold all day, but Zim could now feel the atmospheric tension that came before it rained. He shuddered and made himself move faster. He wouldn't get caught out in the rain if he could help it!

Unfortunately, he couldn't help it, and it started to shower 20 minutes later. He pulled the coat up over his neck and started running. He could easily make the distance; he and Dib used to chase each other twice as far. Zim felt the rain getting heavier, and put on an extra turn of speed, ignoring the rain as it started to soak through his coat and into his shirt, then his skin. He wouldn't let some poisonous rain stop him from getting to his target!

Zim finally reached the house, panting and sizzling, but thankful for the metal helmet that had kept the rain off his head. He removed the keys from his PAK and, with burnt hands, inserted them into the lock and turned them, unlocking the door. He pushed it open and stumbled inside, removing the wet and heavy coat, then his shirt. He was glad that no rain had gotten onto his pants, because he wanted to keep some clothes on.

The room Zim had entered was a long, high ceilinged hallway, with five doors coming off it. Zim opened the door closest to him, and inside were two rather worn armchairs, and a cold, empty fireplace, but with a large stack of wood next to it. Zim left the room in disgust, and entered the next one. The kitchen looked more lived in, with some dirty dishes in the sink, and a few burning embers in the stove. Zim blew on the embers, trying to make them light up and glow hotter. He had learnt skills like this in Invader training, and playing with fire had always been fun to Zim.

Once Zim got the embers brighter and hotter, he fed a bit of paper that had been on the table into the fire, watching it catch and burn. Zim grinned as he placed more paper into the fire. The destruction of human objects was fun. He soon got bored of watching the paper burn, and placed some small flakes of dry wood in the oven. They had been lying nearby, obviously for the humans own fire-making purposes.

Once Zim had the fire going he left the kitchen, to search the other rooms. The first room past the kitchen and living rooms was a room with some wooden devices inside that Zim didn't understand, so he just ignored it and closed the door. The room opposite that one had a bed, cupboard and bedside table. Zim entered it, and saw a picture on the table. He picked it up, and saw two humans, who looked to be in wedding clothes. Zim put it back down, and searched the rest of the room. There were a few monies stored away, which were quickly put into his PAK, and a diamond ring. Zim removed the diamond and threw the ring away.

He left the room, and went to the final door. Opening it, he found a large flight of stairs, leading upwards. He looked up, and carefully put a foot on the first step. Reassured of its solidity, he climbed the rest of the steps. At the top was a room containing two more beds, these ones unmade. Not seeing anything of interest in the room, Zim left and went back to the kitchen, grabbing his clothes on the way through. He laid his shirt on the floor in front of the fire, and hung the jacket up on the back of a chair. Then Zim knelt down in front of the fire, and placed his hands out; not because he was cold, but just for something to do.

Sitting in front of the fire, Zims started to think. He was stuck, who knew how many years ago, on a primitive world, in an even more primitive time. He would never be able to create another STORD, not with the primitive equipment they had. I his own time the humans had only just started to develop the ability to listen to Irken transmissions, they would never have what was needed to make anything useful. He wouldn't even be able to make a transmitter to contact somebody to take him off the planet!

Zim sighed. He would have to increase human technology production by a few centuries to develop even the power needed to run a STORD, let alone the equipment needed to make it. He didn't even know if humans had the solid helium used in the machine.

And thinking of his own time, what was the Dib beast doing, while he was away? He could be breaking into Zims base right now, turning his technology over to the scientists, and the FBI. He needed to get back to the future right away! Before Dib had the chance to know he was away. Every second counted: the longer he was here, the longer he would be away!

Zim jumped up. 'I can make myself another STORD! With my amazing skills I can make one to get back to my time and take over the world!' Then Zim stopped. He seemed to be thinking. 'If I go back, I'll have the Dib stopping me from taking over the world. BUT! If I stay here, I will be unchallenged! I can take over the world now, and have the human race enslaved perfectly by the time the Tallest send me here!' Zim started laughing, then trailed off when he realised there was no one around to hear him gloat. Maybe even while he was here he could kill of the Dibs father, or his grandfather! Yes! Zim would kill the human's grandfather, then the father would never be able to create the Dib.

First he would have to find the Dibs grandfather. That really wouldn't be too hard. Zim had a genetics tracker on him, and it was keyed to Dibs bio-signature. He just had to spread it out so it tracked the human's closest relatives. There couldn't be too many of them. He turned on the tracker and pointed it. It didn't seem to be working very well, so Zim shook it, then pointed it again. It made a few feeble bloorps, then picked up and started tracking a signature.

Zim grinned. Things were going well so far. He could now just set out, and find this human who was related to Dib. It couldn't be too far, the signal was very strong.

Zim checked his clothes to make sure they were dry, then put them back on. He then went to the front door and opened it. Looking out, he saw the rain still pouring down, so closed the door, and went back to the kitchen. His great plan could wait until the rain stopped.

-----

Five hours later Zim looked outside. The skies were clear and blue, and though the ground was still damp and sloshy it wouldn't affect him too much. He placed the helmet firmly on his head, then pulled out the tracker and turned it on. The human seemed to be closer now. He held the tracker out in front of him, and followed its signal.

Zim was walking in a straight line, occasionally stopping for cows that wandered out of the way when Zim bumped into them. Zim stopped when the blorps changed to beeps. The human would have to be close now. Zim looked around, but couldn't see anything except for a clump of trees. He grinned and pulled out a laser, slowly making his way to the clump of trees.

Once entering the cover of the trees, Zim stopped. The human would be here somewhere. Then he stopped and sniffed. There was a fire somewhere, and humans liked fires. He made his way cautiously towards the scene of the fire, stopping when he heard human voices.

'Wonder if the war's stopped yet.' One human said.

'Don't know, but we'll all be court-martialled when it is.' A second one said. Zim crept closer, and could make out two figures.

'Too right. What say we make our way to Paris. I hear the war hasn't got their spirits down yet.'

The second human laughed. 'Yeah, those girls will give a good time to us. Better than what the missus will say when she finds out I've been deserting.' Zim growled. Deserters!

The first human laughed again. 'Joh, with the amount of money you have, the only thing a French girl'll give you is herpes.'

Zim crawled closer towards the humans. The first human had a large spike of hair on his head. Zim grinned. This would be the Dibs grandfather! He could just kill this human, and then he would be free to complete his mission without any of Dibs interference.

Zim stood up, laughing, and brought his laser up and aimed it towards the human. Still laughing, he pulled the trigger, and was surprised to see a nearby tree burst into flames. Zim looked down at the gun. He really should have fixed it when he first noticed that its sights were off. It only worked accurately at close distances, now.

Then he looked up, and saw the butt of a rifle coming down towards his head.

-----

Zim woke up to find himself on his face, in the dirt, with his ankles and wrists tied by some primitive human product, with knees on his back. He shivered slightly at the cold, then gasped. He was naked! He had been stripped of all his clothes by the humans! They could see his alienness. He struggled to get away, only to end up writhing on the dirt.

'Shit!' The knees left his back, and Zim rolled over onto his side. He looked up to see the Dibs' forebear aiming a gun at him, and the other human, the Joh creature, holding a large pair of pliers. Zim sat up and tried to scurry backwards, but was pushed back down by a boot to his ribs. He grunted out at the contact, and stayed lying down.

Joh came over to Zim, and grabbed him by his shoulder. 'What are you?' He asked, shaking Zim harshly. 'Are you working for the Germs? Are you some sort of Goblin, or hideous dead man-creature?' He had seen the film Frankenstein, and it had always stuck closely with him. Wasn't Frankenstein some sort of German name, as well? 'What are you?' he shook Zim again.

Zim pulled away from the human. 'I am ZIM! And I am not a goblin, or a zombie, or a Germ.' He shuddered a bit at the last term. _Germs_. 'I am a soldier from the glorious Irken army, and you will let me go now!' He pulled away from the hand holding his shoulder and fell onto his side in the dirt.

The human holding the gun looked confused. 'Irken? Is that in Belgium? Joh, you know geography. Is Irken in Belgium?'

Joh shrugged. 'Never heard of it. Could be Turkey. Didn't you go to Turkey Ridge?'

Rodge shrugged. 'Never went to Irken. Maybe it's a science experiment, like that movie you were telling me about.'

Joh turned around to look at Rodge. 'Yeah, but nobody would create anything this ugly.' He waved a hand in Zims direction.

'Hey!' Zim shouted. 'I'm not ugly.'

Joh pushed Zim onto his front so he couldn't talk again, then sat on Zims back to keep him held down. 'What if we take it to Paris? We can make some money showing it, and you can get yourself a decent whore.'

Rodge came closer, still with the gun trained on Zim. 'You know I'm not interested in whores. I've got sweet little July and the sock factory back home. I just want to stay alive long enough for the war to end. Some extra money could be good, though; the factory's not going so well anymore.'

He took a few steps closer to Zim. Zim twisted his head to look up at the approaching human. It was definitely a relative of the Dib's. If it came closer, he could risk stabbing it with a spider leg before it got the chance to kill him. Zim grinned. Then he wouldn't have to worry about Dibs meddling any more.

Rodge noticed the grin. 'What are you smiling about, filthy Hun?' He pointed the gun at Zim's face.

'Nothing.' Zim squirmed uncomfortably under the weight of the other human. 'I, uh, just can't wait to go to Paris, yep. That's it. I love Paris.' Zim grinned, again, this time it was strained, though.

Joh laughed. 'You don't have anything to love Paris with. Whoever made you forgot the most important part.' He pat Zim on the head. 'You poor bastard.'

Zim frowned. What? He was completely normal for an Irken, the computers hadn't made a single mistake with him. He wasn't missing any parts. He opened his mouth to question the human, only to have his face shoved in the dirt. 'Shhhh.' Joh hissed.

Rodge looked around, then signalled to Joh, and crouched down and hid in the undergrowth. Joh pulled Zim closer towards the edge of the clearing, and lay down on top of him, hiding the both of them in the undergrowth.

Zim tried to hear what was happening, but his antennae were being crushed by the human. He peeked out through a gap in the gap between the human and the dirt, and looked around. There wasn't anything he could see, until he noticed some moving shadows between the trees. Peering closer Zim realised there were quite a few of them, and they seemed to be marching in formation. It didn't take Zim long to realise that these humans were from some patrol or other, and that his humans were hiding from them because they were filthy deserters. If Zim wasn't trying to hide from the humans himself he would have turned them in.

It seemed like forever before the humans finally passed and Rodge got up from beneath the undergrowth. 'I thought for sure they'd find us this time. Glad they didn't smell the smoke from the fire.'

Joh got up slower, dragging Zim by the throat. 'Their noses are probably too clogged up by the smell of blood to even notice the fire. What should we do about this?' he shook Zim again.

'Dunno, I like the idea of showing it.' He scratched his head. 'People could probably do with the distraction.'

'NO!' Zim didn't want to get shown like some sideshow freak. 'No! Let me go.' He twisted himself around in Johs hands. 'Let me go! I won't turn you in.'

Joh dropped the wriggling Irken into the dirt. 'You couldn't turn us in if you wanted to.' He looked at Rodge. 'We'd better find a more secure shelter next time.'

Zim gasped. He had had a thought! 'The house! Zim has the keys to the house. You can have them if you let Zim go.'

Joh scoffed. 'You don't have any keys. We checked your pockets thoroughly.'

Zim grinned. 'They weren't in my pockets. If you untie me, I'll get them for you.'

Both Joh and Rodge made faces of disgust. 'That's disgusting. If you hid your keys _there_, I wouldn't _want_ to touch them.'

'Eh?' Zim was confused, where were they thinking of. 'They're in my PAK.'

'Oh. Your pack. Yes, that would be much more comfortable.' Rodge looked relieved.

Joh picked up the dropped pair of pliers. 'I'll get them out of there in no time.' He rolled Zim onto his back.

'No!' Zim struggled to get away, but felt heavy knees in the small of his back and the base of his neck. 'No! Just let me go, and I'll give them to you! Don't use the pliers!'

Joh growled and started banging away at the pink dots. They popped open as Zim activated his spiderlegs for self defence. Joh cried out and banged the pliers into the base of the spiderlegs, unknowingly hitting their weak-spots. They shorted out and two screams echoed out as electricity coursed through both beings on the dirt.


	3. Chapter 3

Sorry it's much shorter than the previous chapters, but I couldn't find an appropriate later place to end it.

-- -- -- -- --

Zim moaned as he entered consciousness. His back felt sore and hot, and his head hurt terribly. He also had a feeling of movement, which he put down to being dragged across the ground. He moaned again and tried to lift his arms to hold his head, only to find they were still tied behind his back. The moving feeling stopped, and he had a moment of confusion before he felt something hard and solid hit him in the ribs. He opened his eyes and gasped. Pain! He cringed into a sort of ball, only to feel another boot, this time into his back. He looked up to see Rodge swinging his boot into Zims stomach. Zim coughed pathetically, and was dragged up onto his feet.

Rodge sat Zim on his feet, then pulled the rope that he had tied around Zims chest and under his underarms. Zim took two stumbling steps forwards, then collapsed and was dragged along the ground again. 'Stop.' He croaked out hoarsely, trying to get to his feet again, only to fall over as he was dragged along.

Zim shivered slightly, glad to find that his clothes had been replaced, but was still cold. At least, his pants and jacket were on again. 'Wait, wait.' He called out; he wanted to get back on his feet!

Rodge kicked him again. 'Why should I wait!? You killed him, you miserable little freak.' He punctuated the sentence with another kick, which caused Zim to flinch as he heard the snap of bone.

'Stop!' Zim tried to hold his ribs, but was hampered by his tied arms being behind his back. 'Who's dead?'

'Joh. You killed him with your electrical thing. It only stopped when I shot it, but it was too late for Joh.'

'You... you shot it?' Zim was worried. What had the human hit? He ran a diagnostic to find that, while he wouldn't be able to open it or use any of the accessories, including his spider legs. Thankfully, its ability to keep him alive wasn't hampered at all. 'How could you, filthy human!'

Joh stopped pulling Zim again then knelt down and pulled Zim up by his collar. 'You killed him.' He hissed harshly. 'You killed him, and he thought he was safe. He didn't want to come here, so we escaped before we could be killed by your lot. Then you killed him anyway, when we were safe, away from the front. I didn't want to be hee either. I'm just a sock makers son, I shouldn't be fighting a war.'

'No, no, you shouldn't be.' Zim was starting to form a plan. 'If you let me go, I won't tell anyone that you're a filthy coward who deserted.' Except for Dib. He could use this against Dib so much.

'If I keep you with me you won't tell anyone, either. Anyway no-one would believe you.' He let go of Zims collar, causing him to fall onto the ground. 'You're a strange thing. I'd be surprised if they didn't take you apart to see how you worked.'

'No. No.' Zim struggled up so he was standing on his own feet. 'You can't. I refuse to be autopsied for your hideous species.' The human was looking more and more like Dib. They couldn't have been too dissimilar in age, Rodge perhaps being a few years older.

'Autopsy? I'd say you'd be alive when it happens. I think the word for that is biopsy.'

Zim froze cold. That word. He had seen a biopsy once, done on a mooing cow animal. It had been interesting, but had sickened Zim when, afterwards Dib had told him that would happen to him (after Dib had emptied his own stomach, much to his humiliation and Zims delight). 'Don't you dare come near me, human!' Zim tried to put his arms up to defend himself, failing as they were tied behind his back. Rodge put his hand out to try and stop Zim from falling over, which Zim took as a threat. 'I'm warning you, Dib!' Zim shouted, overbalancing and falling on his back in the mud.

'Who's Dib?' That was the second time Zim had mentioned that name, and Rodge was calm enough to start questioning Zim.

'Oh, no one.' Zim cursed himself. He shouldn't be so scared of this human that he forgot where he was.

'No. That's the second time you've said that name. Who is he? Is he your owner? Or did he make you?'

'Dib does not own Zim! And Zim was not _made_. No the filthy, stinking Dib creature is your...' Zim frowned, trying to think if the right word, 'grand-soon. Yes. Your grand-soon.'

'Grand soon?' Rodge scratched his head. What was the crazy little monster on about? 'Is that some foreign word?'

'No, stupid filth. You are his father's father. He's your grand-soon.'

Rodge shrugged. The thing probably had its brain made wrong. Maybe it had been made out of mental patient parts, which would actually explain a lot about it and its behaviour. 'Of course he is.' Rodge said, speaking calmly. 'Of course he my grand-soon.' He knew he shouldn't, but he was starting to feel a little sorry for the creature. Not only had it been made using insane peoples parts, but it was also so ugly.

'Yes, see. Now, let me go. Let me go, and, uh, I'll, hmmmm.' Zim realised he was in no position to bargain with the human, but he could threaten. 'If you don't let me go, I'll draw the army over here, and you'll be tried for desertion.'

Rodge glared at Zim. 'You wouldn't dare. You'd be taken, too. I could probably get off any charges just for bringing you in.'

Zim frowned at the human. 'I would. They wouldn't like it if you were hiding from them. Maybe I'll call them over when you sleep. I know you humans can't stay awake forever. You would fall asleep eventually, and then you would be finished.' Zim grinned evilly at the human. 'If you untie me, I won't have to.'

Rodge growled at Zim. 'Fine. I'll untie you from this rope, so you aren't dragging along on the ground, but I won't release your hands.' He leaned over and untied the rope under Zims armpits, then lifted Zim up so he was standing. 'You can walk with your hands tied behind your back. And if you complain about that I will shoot you myself. Oh yeah, and here's your helmet back.' He took the helmet off his pack and placed it on Zims head.

Zim nodded. At least he wasn't being dragged along like some sort of dead thing or pet animal anymore. 'So... where are we going?' Zim could easily get away from the human, he just felt like using the human to help him leave this filthy time zone at the moment. That was why the human was still alive and allowed to travel with Zim. Not because of the great big gun. Not at all. It was all Zims idea, and he wasn't scared at all. Not at all.

'Switzerland.' Rodge replied.

Zim wondered why this was. Was the Switzerland place important to the humans? 'Why? Why not France' he asked.

Rodge grinned. 'France was Joh's dream. I just want to get out of the fighting, and Switzerland's the closest neutral country. They won't care that I deserted, and when the war's finished, I can just get passage back to America.'

'Oh.' Zim took a few running steps to catch up to Rodge, who was starting to get ahead of him. 'Don't they care about the war? Are these Switzerlanders as cowardly as you deserters?'

Rodge shrugged. 'I don't know, but it's helpful for me. Now, hurry up.' He called back to Zim, who was lagging behind again. Zim mumbled something insulting, and tried not to trip over as he ran. Stupid long legged human.

-----

Light was starting to show in the sky when Rodge decided that it was time to set up camp for the day. He directed Zim towards a clump of raggedy shrubs that had somehow survived the fighting. Rodge then set up camp in a small clearing in the shrubbery that looked as if it had been used by deserters previously. After Rodge had set a mat down for himself to sleep on, Zim decided that instead of standing around uselessly he could stand on guard. Rodge had quickly accepted that Zim didn't sleep, and when he settled onto the mat he fell asleep almost instantly.

A few minutes later Zim wandered back in from guard duty, to see if the human was sleeping. He was It would be so easy to just kill him while he was sleeping and defenceless. Just crush his face beneath his heel, like some insect or something (Zim couldn't use his hands to do the killing, stupid things still tied behind his back).

He stared down at the human. Stupid, sleeping monster, with his hair and his stupid Dib-ness. If Zim killed him now, that would be two problems solved. The Dib problem, and the being stuck with a useless human problem. It wouldn't solve his hands being tied behind back problem, but that could be fixed later.

Of course, if he did kill the human, he would have to stay out in this battle field. he didn't have any idea where he was, or know how to get back to his house. He was sure he had left the front door unlocked, so he wouldn't need the key to get in.

'You're lucky, human.' Zim said, walking back out to keep a watch on the surrounding landscape. Nothing, nothing and more nothing. Zim had never liked watch duty. Too much standing around, and not enough doing of things. Why had he volunteered? Why did the human need to sleep? Because they were an inferior species that hadn't developed PAKs yet. He glared back in the direction of the sleeping human and went back to watching.

Oooooh. There's the sun rising. Zim watched this for a few seconds, then got bored. What else was there to look at? Dirt, dirt and more dirt. Zim sighed. He hated being on watch.

A few hours later a rather stringy cow wandered past. Zim watched it pass, hissing at it when it got too close. It ignored his hiss and stuck its wet nose into his face. 'Get away from me!' Zim shouted at it. He didn't like cows, stupid animals. How could humans eat them?

The cow lifted its' head slightly at Zim outburst, then leaned down again, and snorted onto Zims antennae, pushing him off balance.

Zim took a step backwards to try and remain standing, but couldn't keep his balance because of his arms being tied behind his back, and fell over and landed on his bottom. 'Stupid cow!' Zim shouted at it. 'Get away from me!'

The cow let out a loud moo in response, then lowered its head to meet Zim again. Zim waved his head to try and force the cow to leave him alone. The cow stubbornly remained with Zim, and snorted onto Zims head again. Zim leaned his head backwards, then brought it forwards with great speed.

The cow let out a loud bellow, then finally turned and left Zim. Zim glared at the cows retreating back. Stupid animal. Now his forehead was all wet, and it was hurting. He tried to bring his hand up to wipe of the cows wetness, but couldn't reach around from behind his back. He could at least stand up, and managed to get to his feet without stumbling.

Zim sighed. Even after the distraction of the cow, he hated being on watch. Surely he could walk at the same time he was watching. He set off around the shrubbery Rodge was hiding in.

When Zim walked to the other side, he looked around again. Nothing. This stupid planet was always full of nothing! He kicked the dirt angrily. Why did that stupid human have to sleep? If he was an Irken they could be travelling again. Of course, if this was Irk, Zim wouldn't be in this trouble, because he could just have made another STORD and left here before he even arrived! It was all stupid Dibs fault. If he hadn't broken the STORD, Zim wouldn't have had to fix it.

Of course, Zim could fix the problem. He could go and kill the human he was travelling with, and make it so the Dib never existed. Then he would never have had to fix the STORD, and would never have come to this primitive time! It was all perfect!

Zim crashed through the bushes angrily, eventually reaching the human. He looked to have had his sleep disturbed slightly, possibly by the noise Zim made as he went through the bushes.

'Stupid human.' Zim muttered to himself. 'Stupid Dib.' He lifted his foot up and placed it just above the humans face. Zim then lined his heel up with the soft part of the tip of the human's nose, where the skull was the softest, and it would be easier to start killing the human from. Zim started shaking in anticipation. He wished he could see Dib's face as he was killed.

Zim closed his eyes to picture the look on Dibs face. He would look all shocked and surprised, maybe even angry. Of course, then he would look dead. Oh how dead he would look. Zim had to restrain his laughter, in case he woke up the human, who was still alive.

Zim opened his eyes again, to look down at the human, and found human eyes staring up at him. 'Uh.' Zim said, before being pushed to the side by the human. 'What were you doing? Huh? Were you trying to kill me?' He picked Zim up by the lapels and shook him.

'N- n- no.' Zim tried to not bite his tongue off as he was being shaken. 'No. I... I was, uh, itching your nose! Yes, Zim was itching your nose.'

'You were itching my nose.' Rodge stopped shaking Zim and held him up higher. 'And how did you know my nose needed itching?'

'Ummm,' Zim was shaking slightly. He didn't want to die here. He hadn't even arrived on the planet yet! 'You were twitching?'

Rodge was having a hard time not itching his nose, now they were talking about it. 'Why were you in here and not out on watch? How could you tell I "was twitching"?'

Zim stopped. His mind was a total blank, more so than usual. 'uhhhh, you... I... uhhhh...' Zim couldn't think of a single reason. 'I couldn't see anyone?' he said in a small voice. Zim could see the gun, standing in the background. He had never thought that a human weapon could be so scary.

'Don't you think you should go back out and look?' Rodge growled at Zim. Zim nodded his head. And if he saw anyone, he wouldn't warn Rodge, and would make them come over to kill the scary deserter. It would take away Zims joy of killing Dibs forebear, but the human would still be dead.

Zim spent the rest of the day watching the surrounding landscape. The hiding place they had taken seemed to be out of the way of patrols or soldiers and far enough away from the fighting for no one to stray their accidently. Of course, sometimes, if Zim listened hard enough, he could hear some explosions from the direction of the trenches. But that was the closest Zim got to any activity.

-----

About halfway through the day, Rodge woke up. He looked around himself on surprise. The homicidal monster wasn't trying to kill him again. He opened his back pack up and pulled out a tin of cold meat. Maybe he should offer some to Zim, just so he didn't starve to death on their trip to Switzerland. And now that he had Joh's rations too...

Rodge shook his head. If the creature wanted to eat, it could find its own food. For all Rodge knew it lived off oil and fried worms! And he didn't have any oil on him, or friend worms. Or any worms. If Zim wanted to eat worms, he could dig them up himself.

Rodge leaned back against a tree. 'I wonder if Zim was taught how to play cards.' he muttered to himself, pulling a worn pack of cards out of his pocket. He and Joh used to have a great time playing poker. Joh owed him about $200, though the conversion rates were it a bit hard to work around. Of course, they both knew that if they had made it out of the war alive, the money would never be collected. It was just for something to do.

Rodge started dealing the cards into piles for a game of solitaire. In the trenches they used to play for cigarettes, or biscuits, or pieces of cake. Any of the little treats they had been sent from home, or from the women's clubs. Rodge wiped a tear from his eye. Of course, that had been before the gas had come and killed the rest of his comrades. Sometimes Rodge wished he had died with them, but then he remembered his family and his girl back home.

Rodge finished the game of solitaire and brought a map out of his bag, then spent the rest of the day planning how long it would take them to get to Switzerland.


	4. Chapter 4

Warning: light swears and some disturbing stuff.

-- - - -- -- - - - -

When the sun was nearly set Zim decided it was time for the two of them to leave. First he had to get the lazy human up. Or he could leave him there, and go on without him. The inability to use his hands prevented Zim from carrying out that plan, though. He pushed through the shrubbery to find Rodge smoking a cigarette and reading a piece of paper. 'Time to move on.' Zim told him.

Rodge looked up. 'Hang on.' He folded the piece of paper back up and placed it in his pocket, then stubbed out his cigarette and stood up. 'We should be in Switzerland in about a week or so, given the terrain, and your short legs.'

'Hey!' Zim shouted. 'My legs aren't that short! If you hadn't broken my PAK I could have gotten there by tomorrow!'

'Sure.' Rodge said sarcastically. 'You have something in there that can magically transport you from one place to another really fast.' He laughed. 'If they had that technology, the war would already be over, and we would be speaking German and hailing the Kaiser.'

Zim scowled at the human. 'Let's just go so we get there sooner, rather than you take all our time up by talking.' Zim turned and marched out of the shrubbery.

Rodge pulled out a compass then set off in the opposite direction, causing Zim to turn around. 'Where are you going, filthy human?!' He shouted.

'Switzerland's this way.' Rodge pointed in the direction he was going. 'And could you be quieter? There might be soldiers around to hear you.'

'I didn't see a single soldier all day.' Zim said, 'there aren't any near here. And if they're as noisy as you are, I would have heard them hours ago.'

Rodge and Zim stepped out of the trees, and stopped about twenty metres away from a group of soldiers. All of them turned to look at the two. 'Don't move!' One shouted, holding his gun up and aiming it towards the two of them.

'No soldiers?' Rodge asked Zim, putting his hands up.

'Not on the other side.' Zim replied, getting ready to run and hide in the bushes they had just come out of. He was not going to be taken by some humans!

The soldiers had moved closer to them, two more pointing rifles towards them. 'Put your hands up!' The soldier who had taken the initiative first shouted at Zim, pointing the gun at him.

'I can't.' Zim shouted back. He tried to use his antennae to push his helmet further down over his face, hoping the humans didn't notice his skin colour beneath the helmet.

'You can't? Why not?'

'I tied his hands behind his back.' Rodge answered, partly to get on their good side. If they thought he was just bringing in a captured German soldier he might be let off easier. 'I am an American soldier, and I caught him yesterday while out on patrol. He was snooping around behind our lines. I was just taking him back to the base, to hand him over for interrogation.'

'Liar!' Zim shouted. If he was going down, he was taking the filthy human with him. 'You're a filthy deserter, and we were both going to Switzerland, so you wouldn't be discovered for the filthy deserter you are.'

Another soldier brought his gun down to point at Rodge. 'Are you a deserter?' He asked.

'Yes!' Zim shouted at the same time Rodge said 'No!'

'Filthy Kraut; let the yank talk.'

'Thank you.' Rodge said. 'I'm not a deserter, I was just telling the prisoner that so he'd come with me easily. I don't really have the supplies for him being hostile.' The other soldiers nodded; they all went through the same supply troubles.

'Filthy lying human!' Zim couldn't believe what this deceptive ape-creature was saying! 'You lie! You're a filthy deserter, and I should have killed you when I had the chance!' He took a leap at the human, and tried to bring him down with his head.

The last soldier, one who wasn't holding a gun, reached out and grabbed Zim by his waist, holding him down on the ground. 'Stupid, Stinking humans! I'll kill all of you, and all of your children, and all of their children! I'll destroy your family, you stinking, lying, deserting-' and then Zim passed into Irken, saying things too vivid for the human mind to comprehend (plus a few things humans aren't capable of).

The soldier with initiative scratched his head. 'What were you doing all the way out here? The centre of the fighting isn't near here at all. And where's the rest of your patrol?'

'I got lost, and couldn't find the rest of my patrol.' Rodge was glad he had inherited some intelligence from his family; he could make up lies on the spot. 'I just remember coming from this general direction. Would you know where I could turn this creature in to?'

'Good to see you hate the Germans as much as we do. We were on our way back to base after we had finished the patrol. We could take you with us, so long as you don't lose us as well.'

Rodge couldn't believe it worked. He was sure somebody would call him out on his deserting, but he had gotten away with it! Finding Zim was the greatest thing that had happened to him!

'Oh dear.' the soldier who had been holding Zim down said very quietly, yet it got everybody's attention.

'What?' Rodge asked, only to be drowned out by Zim, shouting 'Give me back my helmet! Give it back to me! Give it! Giiiive it baaaack!!!!!'

'It _is_ a creature; I thought you just hated the Germans. What is it?' the soldier asked of Rodge.

Rodge shrugged. 'I think it's some sort of monster created by the Germans or the Turks. I don't know what it is.'

Zim was struggling strongly. He didn't like being so exposed in front of all these humans. All these humans with all their large guns, all of which could hurt him. 'Let me go.'

'What should we do with it?'

'Hand it over to our superiors. This discovery could make it up to the very top. The king himself would be proud of us for delivering it to him.'

'No.' Rodge was shocked. 'I found him, so we'll hand him over to the Americans. The president will thank me personally.'

'Why don't we just move it?' The man holding Zim down suggested. 'We can think of what to do with it later. up ya get.' He pulled Zim to his feet.

Zim was shaking. He didn't want to be handed over to soldiers or commanders. He just wanted to be back at his base, with GIR and his experiments. He wanted to talk to the tallests and fight Dib. He didn't want to be stuck here, in this primitive time, with no way to get home and without even access to his equipment. He wondered vaguely if his tallest were even in control yet. He shook. Operation Impending Doom 1 wouldn't have started yet. Zim bit back a sob as he thought hard. He would be killed here, on some backwater planet, in some primitive time, when he hadn't even arrived yet.

How long would it take for his Tallests to realise he was gone? How long then before they sent out a rescue mission? Would they ever find out what had happened to him? He would never see another Irken, never be near another Irken again. It would be a long time before he even arrived here himself. Zim had never felt so alone before. Zim tried to pull away, but too firm a grip was being held on his shoulders and he was forced to continue marching in a straight line.

Zim growled. He was an Irken soldier! He wouldn't be scared of these humans! He wouldn't be scared at the thought of death! No! He wouldn't die here! He would survive and destroy the humans, and rule the planet with a iron fist! He dug his feet into the ground, and stopped suddenly. The human who had been holding Zim hadn't expected him to try and get away again let go of his grip on Zim's shoulders, and fell over the smaller being, leading to them both lying in a heap on the floor. 'Get off me!' Zim shouted, pushing the human away, while the human grabbed at Zim and managed to catch his ankle, pulling him to the ground again.

Zim tried to get back up again, but any of the surprise he had had before had left, and the two of them were circled by soldiers, with guns pointed at Zim. The soldier stood up with help from one of his comrades and pulled Zim up after him. 'Come on.' He said, pushing Zim forwards, while the rest of the soldiers fell into position again.

After a few more hours of walking, the leader of the group of soldiers stopped everyone. 'We're close enough to the trenches to be able to use them for cover as we walk.' He looked around, then jumped down into the trench they had come upon. 'Follow me. We don't want to be shot by the Germans on our way back.'

'Why isn't anybody in these trenches?'

The leader shrugged. 'Does it matter? At least in the trenches we're out of the line of sight and fire from the Germans.'

The rest of the squad decided this was a very good reason to enter the trench, and jumped down after him, with Zim getting picked up and handed down. He struggled in the grip of the humans as he was passed down. 'Let go of me! I'm not some doll toy to be passed around! Let me go!' He was summarily let go by the person who was supposed to be holding him, and fell onto his bottom on the hard wooden slats of the trench. He was about to yell at the clumsy human, before he smelt the air. It was a delicious smell that reminded him of one of the Irken moons.

'Don't be so loud! We don't want them to hear us. And if you know what's good for you, you won't want to retaken by them.'

Zim shrugged. 'You humans are all the same. One set can't be any different from another.'

'Just pipe down and get moving.' The human who had been put in charge of Zim nudged him forwards, getting him to move with the group.

After a few minutes Zim stopped again. The smell had been getting stronger and stronger the further forwards they went 'Can you smell that delightful smell?' He asked, taking a deep breath. 'It smells like the moon of Guney.' He closed his eyes and took a long, deep breath.

However Zims comment was blocked out by one of the soldiers screaming. 'My eyes are burning!'

'Shit! Mustard gas!' One of the humans shouted. His eyes and skin were starting to burn. The mustard gas could have been in the trench for a few days or hours, but now that they were in it there was little chance of living past the week, and if they were lucky they would wish they had died.

'Does anybody have gas masks?' The commander shouted, knowing it was hopeless. Mustard gas would kill you even with a gas mask. He had seen good soldiers die screaming from the burns sustained from the poison.

'Nobody has gas masks.' Rodge replied. 'We need to get out of the trench.' He was holding a hand over his eyes, and scrabbling to get out of the trench, but not having any hope of getting out. They were caught in a death trap.

Zim was shocked at the effect the gas was having on the humans. Their skin was starting to turn yellow and bubble up with blisters, and there were deep red burns all over their skin. They were also screaming in such agony. He couldn't believe a simple gas could cause such pain, especially one as harmless as Ypresite. Of course, the humans found water to be completely harmless, while it burnt Zims skin off, so it must be a species thing. Zim almost wondered why a gas that was so painful to the humans would be doing down here, before he remembered they were in a war. Obviously some other humans had put it in here, and his were just unlucky enough to have wandered into it. Zim didn't know whether to be happy or sad about the human's deaths. At least he wouldn't be taken apart by the scientists, but he would lose the chance to kill the Dib himself.

A knife came out of one of the humans bags, and cut the ropes around Zim's wrists. He spun around quickly, seeing a human look at him with almost blinded eyes. 'You should be able to get out if you can' he said, coughing up blood with the words. 'You shouldn't have to suffer through this with us.' Zim backed away in horror at the human, and turned around, but instantly regretted it.

He saw Rodge, _his_ human, covered in great big yellow blisters, with his hands over his eyes, sitting down and leaning against the side of the trench. Zim walked over and reached out to the human. He knew it was dying, he could tell by the blood leaking out of its mouth.

Rodge coughed, and Zim saw blood fly out of the humans mouth. 'Don't cough! Stupid human! Don't cough!' He reached out and shook Rodge's shoulders, only for Rodge to cry out in pain, and knock Zims hands away.

'Don't.' He coughed. 'It burns.' He took a few deep breaths, shortening his life even faster. 'Can you do something for me, Zim? There's a note in my inside pocket. Can you get it out?'

Zim nodded slowly, and reached out to the human's pocket, pulling back when the human coughed up blood again, splattering it all over his front.

'Do you have it?' Rodge asked.

'Yes. Of course Zim does.' He could just take it off the body later, when the human wasn't coughing up blood and other substances.

'Can you give it to my parents? I... I want them to have it.'

Zim nodded, and turned away. He didn't want to watch the humans dying. He took a deep breath, and relaxed. It was nothing worse than the moon. He wasn't in a war, in the middle of a group of dying humans. He was on the moon, on an expedition to see how laser guns worked. He wasn't in the middle of a trench, billions of kilometres away from Irk. He was on the moon, with Skoodge, Red, Purple and the other trainees. Not stuck in the humans past. He idly wondered where he was, _now_. Was he in the training program, or fighting hordes of angry screwheads? Who was the tallest? Was it Plodge? He had been tallest before Red and Purple grew taller than him, then had him executed and removed from the official history of the Irken empire. It wasn't even allowable to mention him in public. Red and Purple never had to be in a trench, in the middle of a group of dying humans. Not that he was. He was on the moon, learning about giant robots and other fun things. After half an hour Zim started to believe he was on the moon. The silence of the humans helped his fantasy continue. They had gotten quieter and quieter as their whimpers died off.

He opened his eyes expecting to see the purple dirt of Guney, but just stared at the yellow and blistered corpse of a human. He closed his eyes for a few seconds to reorient himself. He was in a trench, surrounded by dead humans. He turned around and opened his eyes. And there was Rodge, all _dead_.

Zim tentatively leaned over, and flipped open Rodges coat, removing a note, and trying not to glance at the dead body. Why did humans have to die so... uglily? With blood, and blisters? Irken weapons killed with cleanness, not hideous blisters and bleeding.

He turned away and followed the trench until the smell of Guney dissipated, though it was still attached to his clothes. When Zim was well away from the bodies, he sat down by the wall of the trench to think. Why was he still here? Surely Rodge's death should have destroyed the Dib, and caused Zim to return back to his own time.

He shrugged; that would be something for him to figure out later. He looked at the note in his hand, and decided to read it. 'Dear Mother and Father," blah, blah, blah. Zim skipped the part where the human expressed emotions of sadness. Then he started talking about his partner, and how he wished they could have gotten married... Zim skipped that and turned over to the next page. "... little brother..." caught Zim's attention. The human had a younger brother? An apparently two year old, younger brother. A younger brother named "Dib." How could the human have had a younger brother? How could Zim not have known? How could Zim not have remembered Dib was named after his grandfather?

'Stupid Human!' Zim shouted. He tore the note up angrily. 'Stupid, disgusting breeding humans!' He stood up to throw the pieces of paper on the ground and stamp on them. 'STupid humans! With your trading of blood!' And your relations!' He ground the paper into the dirt. 'Stupid lying human! Tricking Zim into thinking he was the Dibs grand father! No! No! He was nothing more than the Dibs grand father's brother! Stupid HUMAN!!!'

Zim sat down in a huff. Stupid, tricksy humanses. How dare he make Zim believe that he was- 'Aaaaahhh!' Zim screamed, banging his fists on the floor. And how was he supposed to get out of this trench?


	5. Chapter 5

Sorry about the length of time between updates, but I was suffering from severe writers block, and have to study for upcoming essays. Plus, playing Zelda has been taking up a lot of my time.

And due to unforeseen circumstances, I was without the internet for a week.

- -- -- - - -- - -- -

Zim was back in the gassed area. After almost running into a group of soldiers having a smoke away from the worst of the fighting, he had decided it would be safer if he was in an area that humans couldn't enter. He had made it back to where his group of humans had died, and was sitting down next to Rodge's corpse, eating a biscuit he had taken from another soldiers backpack.

'So I told him, "if you give me an F, you will dress as a monkey and dance for GIR when this planet is conquered." And do you know what he said? Do you know what he said!?'

The corpse gave Zim a rather stony silence, as would be expected from a dead man.

'He said that i had a vivid imagination, but threats wouldn't get me anywhere! And then I was given an F! Can you believe that I, Zim, would fail English!? Can you believe it!?'

There was silence on the other end of the conversation.

'I'm sure you're as stunned as I was. And then he expected me to go to skool over the summer! Can you believe that! Use up my valuable non-skool time to improve in a subject so stupid! When we Irkens take over, none of you will be speaking English anyway, so the class is just another _futile, unnecessary _thing that won't matter to anybody!' Zim stopped in his monologue. 'I should turn him into a turtle! No! I should mulch him, and turn him into one of those word books he's so fond of! Yes! And his skin can form the cover! Wouldn't that be great?' He turned to the slowly decomposing Rodge, who didn't respond to Zims rhetoric question. Not that Zim minded; it was easier to talk to a body than any living, or robotic, thing that might decide to interrupt him or "correct" him when he got something "wrong". How dare they suggest that Zim was wrong!

'How dare they!' Zim screamed, standing up and raising a fist. 'How dare they not believe Zim when he told them he was going to conquer this stupid planet. They laughed, and turned off the transmission. But I'll enslave all of you pitiful humans, and then they'll know that Zim is amazing! They'll all know!!' Then he stopped and looked around himself. Though there was nobody around, he felt slightly ashamed about his outburst. He coughed twice, then say back down again and nibbled on the biscuit. 'Of course, the Tallests are still the wisest leaders any Irken could wish to have, despite their unseeingness of the amazingness of Zim.' He looked at Rodge. 'You wouldn't understand. You're just a dead human.'

Rodge didn't reply to Zims statement, nor to his previous outburst. Zim finished eating the biscuit in silence, except for the sounds of far away battle.

Zim stayed sitting in silence for a few seconds after finishing the biscuit, but then got bored, so stood up and stretched. 'What else are you humans carrying?' he asked, looking at Rodge's body first.

-----

When Zim had emptied out every pocket and backpack of the dead soldiers, he had three large piles of items, each sorted according to usefulness. The first pile was composed of photos and letters taken out of soldiers pockets; plus pay books from the soldiers backpacks. There were also some clothes and blankets on this pile, as well as anything else that was flammable. All of these were burning merrily, having been torched by Zim using matchbooks from the soldiers' pockets. Zim was sitting quite close to the fire, as the cold was starting to settle into the air, and it was starting to get colder than it had been in previous days.

The second pile Zim had placed items that he considered to be useless, but couldn't be placed into the fire. This pile consisted of water bottles that Zim had tipped all the water out of, utensils and inedible rations. It also had the soldiers helmets and identification, and anything else that was made completely or partly out of metal. There were also gas masks and guns on the pile, which Zim had taken apart as best he could given his limited equipment, and examined to find out what kind of technology the humans had. He deemed it to be even more primitive than the technology of the time he had originally arrived in the future, and was wondering how these humans could even wage a war with such primitive devices.

In the third and smallest pile were items Zim had decided would be useful and so could be kept for himself. In this pile was a waterproof sheet, a knife, a box of matches and the rest of the biscuits that Zim had removed from the humans bodies. The knife and matches had already disappeared into the pockets of Zims coat. There was also a piece of folded paper, the only one that had escaped the fire. It had a map of the area, including the different countries that were nearby.

Zim looked at his three little piles and grinned to himself. Then he picked up one item he had removed from Rodge's coat, and the one paper item that had escaped the fire pile. Though Irkens never used paper maps, and rarely used physical or holographic maps unless it was for debriefing, Zim still knew how to read one, having taken a jeograffy course in Hi-skool. He had nearly failed it, not understanding the way humans catalogued their geography, but still had a passing knowledge of human maps and how to read them.

He spread the map out on the ground of the trench, using boots to hold the corners down, and placing it near the fire so he could see it.

Zim stared at it for a long time. He was somewhere on this map. He had to be. After five minutes of hard concentration he shouted 'Ah-ha!' and pointed to a section. 'Zim is in, ummm, Paris?' Zim looked at the map again, and then at the surrounding area. He knew what Paris looked like; it had a big tower thing in it. This was not Paris.

Zim scratched his head. He was, apparently, near Switzerland, which was near here. He pointed to the map where Switzerland was. And to get to Switzerland, Rodge had pointed in _that_ direction. Zim scratched his head. So that would mean he had to go in _that_ direction to get to Switzerland. Zim pointed towards back the way they had come.

Zim scratched his head again. That didn't seem to be right, but he had no other way of knowing where to go. If only the humans had used some sort of directional key on their map, Zim would know where to go. Zim searched the map harder. There seemed to be some sort of arrow-thing, with some stupid human letters on it, but Zim couldn't see how that could be a direction system. It stayed the same direction no matter what way you turned the paper! If only the humans were more advanced.

Zim stared at the arrow thing again. It seemed familiar... He stuck out his lower lip as he tried to remember what the stupid human teacher had yelled at him. Zim scratched his head once more. He had been standing in the front of the class, and the students had been laughing at him...

Zim thought hard for about five minutes before he remembered. 'Of course!' He shouted. 'The arrow things are pointing out the directions! Now I can find out what direction to go, using their sun!' Zim stopped in his proclamation. 'But i must not look directly at it!'

Zim shaded his eyes and looked up towards the sky. It was starting to get lighter, from that direction. And since the planet travels anti-clockwise, the Switzerland must be... Zim looked down at the map key again 'That way!' He shouted, pointing in the opposite direction of Switzerland.

'Ahhhh!' Zim suddenly shouted, pulling his pointing finger back against his body. He looked down at it, and saw it was smoking. He whimpered, then looked up, fearing the worst.

He was rewarded for his fear when a big fat raindrop fell between his eyes. 'AAhhhhh!' He screamed, grabbing the waterproof sheet and pulling it over himself like a tent, then dragging the map inside with him, folding it up and shoving it into a pocket.

The shower was quite light for a few minutes, leading Zim to feel almost safe within his makeshift tent, but before long the rain had started coming down faster and heavier. Zim huddled further beneath his tent, and wrapped it around his body to wait out the rain.

About fifteen minutes into the rain storm water started leaking underneath Zims blanket. Zim looked down at it in fear. It looked different to normal water; like it had a sheen on it. Zim lifted his legs out of the way of the water, and pulled the blanket tighter around himself. He saw the water start creeping slowly towards him, and started shaking in fear.

Zim was shaking so hard he lost his balance, and had to put a hand out to steady himself. He placed his hand in the water, and pulled it back with a gasp. He stared at his hand, and instead of just the normal burning that comes with water, his hand started to blister and the burn was twice as bad as it usually was. He rocked backwards in shock, then leapt to his feet, which he soon realised to be a mistake, as his unbooted feet touched the water.

There was an immediate hissing as Zims feet started blistering and burning on contact with the water. Zim stopped breathing for a few seconds, then ran screaming through the trenches in the rain, leaving the gassed area far behind.

His feet eventually gave out, and he collapsed to the ground, landing in a ditch of water. He dragged himself out of the ditch and wrapped the tarp around himself, curling up into a small ball and whimpering every time he felt some water leak in through a gap in his shelter.

It was two hours before the rain slowed, and Zim didn't poke his head out of the blanket before he was sure the rain was completely over. When he did get out, he slowly sat up, staying on the blanket and ensuring that he didn't touch the ground with his feet.

His feet. Zim slowly looked at them, dreading what he would see. The soles had lost most of the skin that covered them, and were coated in open sores and split blisters. Zim ripped a piece of cloth off his coat and delicately wiped the blood off his feet, being careful not to press to hard on the wounds, wincing when he pressed too hard on the cuts. When he had cleaned off his feet satisfactorily, he looked at them again. Thanks to his incredible Irken healing skills they had already stopped bleeding. Unfortunately, Zim would need to get up soon to go to Switzerland, so they would probably crack open again, unless he found somewhere to hide from the humans.

Zim looked at his feet again and snarled. He didn't even have any disinfectants to put on them! Who knew what sort of hideous germs would enter while they were healing. He couldn't even leave if he wanted to! There was still water everywhere in the trenches, and it wouldn't be gone for a while if Zim knew water.

He looked down at the blanket he was sitting on. Then back to his feet. Maybe if he just created water-proof boots for his feet... Zim picked up the knife and cut two squares off the tarp, and wrapped them around his feet, tying them up with some rope he had taken from the bodies. He shuddered at the feeling of dirty blanket against his skin, but got up anyway, leaning against the wall to take some of his weight off his feet.

Then he started moving forwards, slowly and stiffly, looking for a way out of the trench system and a way to get to the safety of Switzerland. While he was moving forwards, he also kept a look out for any humans that might be coming up in front of or behind him.

Zim eventually found a wall of the trench that wasn't as vertical as the others, so he dragged himself up it, and lay on the top when he reached it. 'Have to get away.' He mumbled, dragging himself upright, and collapsing again as his feet refused to hold his weight.

He fell down with a moan, and held his burning feet close to him. There was no way he could walk to Switzerland in this condition! And he was not going to crawl there.

Zim rolled partway onto his back and looked up at the sky. Maybe he could stay lying here, just until his feet felt better, and didn't burn or collapse when he tried to stand.

Deciding that, though he couldn't stand up, he could at least sit up and watch for incoming humans, weapons or cows, Zim sat up, with his feet sticking up in front of him. He looked around himself eagerly, taking note of the position of the sun in the rapidly clearing sky.

If the sun was _there_, then he was on the right side of the trench for getting to Switzerland. A part of his brain told him he was going back in the direction he had come from, but Zim ignored it, much as he ignored the computer when it was telling him the base was going to explode, or that he had reconnected the STORD wrong.

Zim thought about the STORD again. It had required material that only came from a small area in the Ororborous system, materials the Zim was sure didn't exist on Earth. He also wasn't sure that it could be used for anything relating to the future, like changing or viewing the future, or travelling there. Zim shrugged, wriggling his feet happily. He could fix those problems when he came to them. The first problem was getting to Switzerland.

Zim looked around to make sure no humans were near, then dragged himself further from the side of the trench. He then fell onto his side and rested for the next five hours.

-----

When Zim got up he unwrapped the blankets from his feet and looked at them. They seemed to be okay; at least they were starting to heal over. He brushed most of the dirt off his feet. Then he poked them, and they felt sore, but he would easily be able to walk on them, though it would be slowly and would take him longer then he would normally walk, but he would be able to go. He tied his "boots" back on again.

Zim stood up and stretched out, reaching his arms above his head and stretching out on the tip of his toes. He realised this was a mistake soon afterwards.

'Who's there?' A voice called from the trench below.

'Uuuh.' Zim froze, and slowly lowered his hands. If he just crept off slowly...

He had made it about five paces when a soldiers head popped over the top of the trench. 'Stop where you are!' The voice shouted.

Zim stopped. He didn't know if he'd be able to outrun the human, not with his feet so bad. He turned around slowly, and was amazed at what he saw. This human was old, by human standards. Possibly in his fifties, or forties. Zim had a hard time telling the difference.

The human, being below eye-level, got a clear view of his face under the helmet. His gun rose automatically. 'Stop right there, whatever you are.' He pointed the end of the gun at Zim.

Zim grinned. This old human would have slower reflexes, and wouldn't be able to get him if he jogged fast enough, and he wouldn't have to go far to get out of the humans range. Zim turned around and moved off as quickly as he could, hearing one bullet get fired and miss him completely.

Unfortunately for Zim, the other bullet wasn't as far from it's mark, and hit him in his shoulder.

The human climbed to the top of the trench when he saw Zim fall to the ground. 'I'll be taking you to command. They can figure out what you are.'

Zim sat up, holding his shoulder and growling. He was getting so sick of this planet, and the accursed war, and the stupid humans! He wanted to get to Switzerland, and build the STORD, and just take over this planet in peace. But instead he was shot, assaulted, tied up and burnt with poisonous water. He couldn't even kill them, because his PAK was broken, caused by the humans. Zim was getting fed up with it all.

'I am getting really annoyed with you stupid, meddling _humans_.' He spat the word like it was a curse. 'I just want to be left alone to take over this stupid planet in peace, and have my genius recognised.' He got up slowly. 'But you always get in my way.' He grabbed the front of the soldier's coat, and pulled him down closer to Zim's level.

His free hand reached inside his coat and brought out the knife he had previously placed in there. He shoved the knife through the humans stomach, and ripped it open. 'Just let Zim get to Switzerland in peace.' He dropped the human on the ground and limped off in the direction he had been going.

The last thoughts to pass through the dying man's head were: "Switzerland is in the other direction."

-----

Zim stopped when the sun began to rise, and hid in the burnt out remnants of an old barn. His PAK was starting to complain about the lack of incoming nutrients, and the large amount of energy it had to expend to try to fix itself and his injuries, which would take 4 days if he got adequate nutrients and didn't exert himself. Zim begrudgingly told it to fix itself later, when it had enough nutrients to work, and regretted leaving the biscuits behind when he had been forced to flee the poisoned area. Then he set about checking his own wounds. One of his feet had healed nicely, but the other one had a large tear that was making it difficult to keep up a solid pace.

Zim hesitated before checking his shoulder. He had removed the bullet and put a thin bandage on his shoulder when he had left the humans sight, but had been ignoring it since then. He slid his jacket off, and unwrapped the stiff, blood soaked bandage. He couldn't see it easily, because it was on the back of his shoulder, but it felt sore and inflamed. Zim winced at the feel of it, and removed his hands. He didn't have any of his medical technology, or even just any pills. This sort of thing had never been covered in any of the classes he had taken, and he had never been forced into any situation like this before. There had always been a back up team, or a way to contact help, or even just his base's supplies. Zim was honestly at a loss as to what to do. He couldn't go to the humans for help, but he also couldn't use any of his own technology.

unless...

Zim shook his head. That was a last resort action, if the only other options led to death. Of course, Zim couldn't see much else happening to him in this primitive time other than death, so it was an option he had to keep open.

He pulled the coat back over his shoulder. It was something he could consider later, when he had found some permanent shelter. He got up and kicked the burnt skull that was lying on the floor. The sooner he found some shelter, the easier it would be to make a decision. The place he found might even have appropriate medicines. Or his shoulder might have healed by then.

Zim tried to keep positive as he moved away from the barn. His shoulder couldn't get any worse before he found shelter, could it?

-----

After an hour or so of walking, Zim found an empty, abandoned farm house, which hadn't been too far from the shed. Zim idly wondered if the two were connected, and noted that the house looked similar to the one he had been in a few days ago. Zim put it down to the way all human dwellings looked the same.

Zim easily made it inside because the door had been left unlocked, and there didn't even seem to be any humans inside the building, not that Zim couldn't take care of them if they appeared. He gingerly removed his coat, and felt his shoulder. It had become harder and harder to move over the past half hour, and hurt strongly whenever the coat brushed against it. Now it was physically hotter to the touch, and felt much more inflamed. Zim wished he could see it properly, and so conducted a brisk search of the house. He found a worn, cracked mirror in the bathroom, and brought it into the living room, where a large window provided lots of lighting.

He propped the mirror up against one of couches, and looked at his shoulder in the reflection. What he saw shocked him. Where there was normally bright green skin, around the wound was a dark green, almost black colour. He started shaking. That was not a healthy colour for anything to be, and called for drastic action to be taken.

Zim reached around behind himself and removed his PAK, taking a deep breath to overcome the feeling of light-headedness that overcame him. Then he took the poker from the fire and used it to lever the back of the PAK off from the rest of it, using a single weakness in the design that was only told to soldiers of elite status or above.

When Zim levered the back off (8 Minutes to go), he took a look at the tangle of chips and wires that made up most of the PAK. He gently moved most of them to the side and out of the PAK (7 minutes and 15 seconds to go to go), and took another deep breath. Now he just had to search through the rest of the PAK.

He moved aside boxes that contained spare tentacles, spare legs, the actual tentacles and the real legs. Guns, rechargers, bombs and ammo were removed. He removed one of the guns for his own use. (5 and a half minutes to go.)

Zim blinked away some dizziness he was starting to feel, and moved aside nutrient recyclers and waste recyclers. He started to hate the PAK's ability to hold more than it's size would suggest. Finally, way down at the bottom of the PAK, he found the emergency medical kit. He unclipped it from its position, and placed it down on the ground of the house. (4 minutes to go.)

Then Zim replaced the recyclers where they might have gone. The boxes, tentacles, guns and spiderlegs were dumped in a spread out heap in the general place they might be meant to go. The wires had tangled themselves in the few minutes they had been discarded, so Zim just threw them back in the PAK, not caring about any order they might have kept (3 minutes to go).

Then he looked at the base plate. It was dented up one side where Zim had levered it off, and he didn't know if it would still fit on the PAK. Zim put it down on the floor and then whacked it with the poker to try and flatten it out. Once he was happy with it's flatness (2 minutes to go), Zim placed the base plate over the PAK, hoping they would stick together, feeling happy when he heard a slight humming inside the PAK as the base plate started to join with the PAK.

He replaced it on his back, and waited a tense 15 seconds before the wires reconnected with his spine, and he felt himself become more clear headed. Of course, now his PAK was coming up with more complaints, and gave estimated recovery time at 2 weeks, if Zim could get to his base. Zim told it to fix what was needed to continue working, and leave the rest for later.

From the medical box Zim removed a sterile wipe. He used the wipe to clear dried blood away from the wound, and a lot of dirt came off with the wipe as well. With the wound cleaner, Zim looked at it in the mirror again. It was no longer a nearly black colour, but was still much too dark for his liking, and swollen. Zim shuddered. He hated this planet and this primitive time, when dirt could get into wounds and turn them _that_ colour, and make them... He looked closer. It had started to leak a yellowish fluid, caused by his aggravating of the area by cleaning it up.

Zim shuddered and picked up a needle from the medical kit. This would help heal his shoulder, and his feet, much faster than if he had left it up to his broken PAK, or his bodily systems. It also caused an Irken to fall asleep, but that couldn't be helped. He removed the cap from the needle, and squeezed the air bubbles out of it. Then he injected it into his shoulder vein, crawled up onto the couch while he still had the energy, and let the medicine do the rest of the work.


	6. Chapter 6

Final chapter for this section of the story.

- - -- - - --- --

3 months later...

Zim was listening to the radio report eagerly. Today was a great day, both for humans and for Zim. An armistice had been signed, effectively ending the war. When the report was over, Zim turned off the radio and looked at the clock. 11:10 in the morning. Time to work on the STORD.

Zim walked down into the cellar, going through to kitchen to reach it. Here was his lab, where bits of broken war machines that had been salvaged at night were placed. Sometimes these items made their way back to Zim in relatively good condition, if whoever was looking after them was alone and had their back turned.

So far he had some wires and sheets of metal that would possibly be useful for making another STORD, but it wasn't looking hopeful. The humans were just too primitive in this time for him to even be able to start creating another STORD, especially not if he had to work from the ground up.

Zim sighed and went down the stairs. He was no good at this; he should have a minion to do the repetitive, mind-numbing tasks. Zim kicked aside a scrap of tyre that resided at the foot of the stairs, and watched it skid across the floor, coming to an abrupt halt before Zims box of tools, all of which were pathetically primitive. It mainly consisted of variously sized axes, hammers and screwdrivers, all in various states of brokenness.

Zim growled and flicked on the light switch. At least he had installed electric lights down in the basement, which was a much harder task than usual because of the isolation of the area. There weren't even any power lines he could steal from! He had spent his first week in the house just making a primitive generator, so he could power the lights and the radio. he had also gone through the house from top to bottom, eventually finding clothes that somewhat fit him. They smelt of must and human, and had been stuck in a box in the roof of the house, but he now had a shirt and another pair of pants, which had come as a great relief as his own pair had been covered in dirt and mud. He still didn't have a pair of boots.

Zim walked over to the recently liberated front part of a plane, which had crashed a few nights ago. It had taken Zim far too long to drag the plane back to his base, which was another thing a minion would be useful for. Zim nearly tripped over the detached and broken propellers, so picked them up and dragged them to the side of the room, to be put with the other useless junk; the pile of which reached nearly to the top of his head. Zim sighed decided it would be time to empty the cellar soon, which would be another day or so of lost time. Then he forgot about it and went back to the plane, staring at the cockpit for a few minutes. He picked up a screwdriver he had left there the previous night, and set about completing the job of removing the dashboard to get to the wires underneath.

it was hard and dirty work; nothing that an invader should have to do, especially not one of his standing. Zim breathed out and wiped his forehead. He really needed to get a minion.


	7. break

2 years later...

Zim grinned and looked at his interstellar communicator. It wasn't a proper one, and would probably burn out after 5 minutes, but that would be long enough for Zim to contact the Tallests and ask for them to send assistance. They might not know it yet, but Zim was (would be?) their best soldier and one of their most useful invaders!

Zim tapped the radio he had removed from his PAK, to make sure it was properly secured to the shambles of human equipment he had used to boost the signal; there was even more of it sticking out of the roof of the house he had claimed as his base.

Zim brushed some dirt off the front of his shirt, annoyed that it wasn't regulation Invader issue clothing, and turned on the communicator, holding his breath as he waited for the signal to connect.

After a tense twenty seconds, during which Zim was starting to feel the need to breathe, The tallest appeared, blurred and staticky, but still very much the Almighty Tallest Red and Purple that Zim knew.

'My Tallest,' Zim started respectfully, 'I realise you probably wouldn't recognise me, but I am in dire need of your assistance.'

Both Tallests stared at the screen in shock. It looked like Zim. It looked so much like Zim. But it couldn't be, he didn't have access to their channel, and his overseers were under strict instructions to not let him near the communicators. They had been starting to hope he was dead; maybe eaten by a Planet Jacker.

'Zim.' breathed tallest Red, 'what are you doing contacting us? And why aren't you wearing your mechanic uniform?' Maybe they could get him executed for this, not that he'd die, of course.

'My Tallest, I am not the Zim that you know! I am the Zim from the future! And I need transport off this stinking planet that you sent me to! You see I -'

'Stop!' Red shouted, trying to ignore Purple, who was banging his head into his hands, and whimpering 'He's not dead, he's not dead, he's not dead.'

'Zim, if you tell us anything about what you're doing, or where you are, you'll tear a hole in time and space!' Red knew this wouldn't happen, but he would say anything to stop Zim from talking.

Zim scratched his antennae, then shrugged, and decided to trust the Tallests wisdom. 'Very well, my Tallests. Maybe you could just send somebody to bring me back to Irk, or a minion for me to use?'

'No!' Purple shouted out. Zim couldn't come back to Irk from where ever he was. One Zim was bad enough, but two would be terrifying. 'You can't come back to Irk, Zim. Because, Uhhhh,' He looked over to Red to complete the sentence.

'Because if you met yourself, you'd create a terrible paradox, and rip the universe into pieces!'

'But, my Tallest! I could hide, I wouldn't have to see myself at all!' Zim knew that time was running out; he was starting to smell burning wires and plastic.

'No! Do you remember coming back to Irk now? Do you? Huh? No, you don't. So you _can't _come back.'

Zim stopped. 'That doesn't even make sense...'

'We're your Tallest Zim, of course it makes sense.' Purple paused. 'We are your Tallests, aren't we? There's nobody taller than us, is there?'

Zim laughed. 'Of course not, my Tallests, you're still Taller than everybody else, and you are the most amazing Tallests ever, with your amazing plan to-.'

'Well that's a relief.' Purple cut Zim off from revealing more about their futures. 'You're not to come back to Irk, Zim, or to Irken space. Who knows what damage two of you might do.'

'To the timelines!' Red added hastily, in case Zim noticed something amiss. Of course, Zim was having his own troubles on his end; there was a lot of smoke in the air. 'You might cause untold damage to the timelines if you come back. Just stay where ever you are, and wait for yourself to dissappear, or however you got there.'

Zim coughed slightly. 'Yes my Tallests. While I'm trapped here, I will do the most I can to help myself take over this wretched planet for you.' He waited for them to reply, then noticed through the thick smoke that they had already turned their end off. Zim waved some of the smoke away, then jumped back as a small fire broke out.

-----

Almighty Tallest Red turned to Almighty Tallest Purple. 'Do you know what this means?'

Purple shook his head, not out of unknowingness, but because he was in shock. Two Zims. It was too much to deal with; he needed some calming nachoes, a rare treat for the two hardworking Tallests, but he and Red deserved them.

'It means we can't kill him.' Red started sobbing into his hands. 'We can't kill him until after he's sent that message. Do you know how long we'll have to put up with him for?'

Purple nodded. '80 more years, at least.'

'At least!' Red agreed. 'Who knows how much damage he'll do in that time!'

Purple shrugged. 'He would know,' he pointed at the now blank screen, then grinned as the nachoes arrived. 'Do you want some? I think we deserve it.'

Red nodded and grabbed some. '80 more years.' He muttered to himself, shoving the nachos into his mouth and calling for soda to be brought to them.


	8. Chapter 8

Disclaimer: I own nothing in this fic. Absolutely nothing, except for some of the characters, and various settings.

Lest we forget (to update on time. At least it's still Remembrance Day over in America.)

* * *

Late March sometime, 1939.

Zim was digging over his garden when he first heard the knocking at the door. He growled and stuck his fork deeper into the earth, turning it over with more force than was needed. He had thought all these people would stop bothering him now that the depression was over. Not a single week had gone by without some human knocking at his door, asking if he needed help, or had any spare money or food or clothes. As if he would give them to humans.

The he grinned. Of course, that one human had been fun. He had never known that humans could live without part of their brain before that. Zim sighed. The other one, who had been useful, ended up getting a human sickness of some kind and dying. Of course, he had still be useful afterwards. That year he had grown the best potatoes he had ever tasted, and so many of them! Not that the human food was any substitute for good Irken snacks. He had had to sleep every human month because they didn't give him as much energy as snacks would, and he couldn't go into the town to get decent food. AND it had taken him far longer to fix his PAK than normal.

Zim continued turning the dirt after the knocking at the door finished. He was nearly finished with the row when he heard a loud crashing coming from the house.

Dropping the fork quickly, Zim ran to the house, and entered through the kitchen doorway. There, sitting in a pile of dented, fallen pots was a filthy, smelly human. He looked up at Zim, then gave a small scream and backed away. 'Don't kill me, don't kill me!' he begged. 'I just came looking for food, or spare money... Please don't kill me.'

Zim walked over to the human, and placed a foot on his stomach, holding him down. 'You came here looking for food? Do you know how sick I am of you pathetic humans and your inability to make your own food? Instead you come to me and want to eat my vegetables, and my fruits, all of which the mighty Zim grew from the ground.' He pressed his heel into the humans stomach. 'Nor do I have any of the monies you humans are constantly looking for.' That was a lie. Zim had a small amount of money stolen from corpses stashed away, but he wasn't going to let the humans use it. Unless it was to buy things that Zim told them to get him.

Then Zim stepped off the human's stomach. 'Anyway, the depression's over, in case your filthy human brain could not figure that out. You'll be able to get a job in the town about 6 km that way.' Zim pointed down the road. 'But if I hear anything about them finding out about me, I will hunt you down and use you to fertilise my pumpkins.'

The human shuddered. 'I'm not looking for a job; I just want to get as far away from Germany as I can.'

'Why?' Zim was curious. 'They seem to have an amazingly competent leader, as far as humans go. I would be glad to have him as my tallest.' Zim listened to the radio every day for the humans news. Unfortunately among the stations he picked up was a German National broadcaster. 'I even hear he's been doing great things to get rid of the plague of Jew monsters.'

The human turned away from Zim in disgust. 'If you knew what he was doing, really _knew_, then you would not say it was great, you would be ashamed to even call yourself German.'

'I would never lower myself to identifying with a stupid human country's people thing.' Zim's description tailed off. 'Especially not one of your many different groups. They're stupid, and pathetic, and only separate you so that finally conquering your species will be so much easier!' Zim turned and picked up a piece of paper from the table. 'Anyway, see what they look like. They're a hideous, foul creature, and I'm glad to let the humans be able to kill them all, before I have to.' He gave the paper to the human, and stood back looking smug.

The human took the piece of paper. On it there was a grotesquely caricatured image of a human with a large nose, holding a bag labelled "Jew gold." The human looked up at the Irken. Should he correct him about his mistake, or would he be killed if he did. 'This is a cartoon.' he eventually said.

'Yes. You foolish humans haven't even discovered photography yet.' Zim was still looking smug.

The human tried again. 'This is a _political_ cartoon. For propaganda.'

Zim heard the tone in the humans voice, and his smugness started to decrease. 'so..?' He asked, slowly.

'It's not an accurate drawing. It's an exaggeration to make people agree with the political ideas. That is not what a jew looks like, nor how they act.'

Zim pulled the paper away from the human, placing it back on the table. 'Stupid human, Zim knew that. But they're all filthy anyway. All the humans, and the pigs, and the children.' He shuddered. 'Filthy primitive, backwards, _lying_ humans. Only interested in Zims money, and food, and house. Only good for workers or mulch. You!' he shouted at the human, who had been backing away from Zim as he muttered to himself. 'You can clean up this mess. And tell me your name.'

'Kurt. I'm Kurt.' He said, getting up slowly and picking up a saucepan that nearly had a hole worn through its bottom. 'Kurt... Ruebel.' He decided it would be better not to use his real last name, in case the creature decided to kill him.

Zim nodded, and sat down on a worn chair. 'And when you've finished that, you can come out and dig up some dirt in the garden. I won't pay you, but you will be allowed to eat my food, and sleep in one of the beds upstairs. I will also give you money to go and buy other foods from the village. But if I find out you're stealing money, I'll find you and kill you. There's always other people coming that I can use.'

Kurt picked up a frying pan that had its bottom completely burnt through, and held it out to Zim. When did he agree on being unpaid labour?

Zim picked up the frying pan. It would be useful for his STORD. He carried it down into the basement, using a hatch Kurt hadn't seen in the floor.

When Zim was gone, Kurt stopped putting the pots and pans away. Maybe he could use this as a chance to escape from the possibly slightly mad monster. He could go to the village down the road, maybe get a paying job, or he could stay here, was there was less chance of any S.S. troops finding him. Nobody would come here, so he would be completely safe; and despite the creatures previous hostility, he was sure it wouldn't turn him in to the German government, especially not since he was in France.

'Zim?' he called down the hole in the floor, 'What's your name? And what are you'

'Zim.' Zim replied, still searching for a place to set the fry pan. He eventually decided on the seat of a car which was in the process of being taken apart for parts. 'You shall call me Zim. And I am an Irken, one of your future slavemasters! One day you you shall all bow down to me!!!'

Kurt nodded, Zim was definitely insane. He started humming as he put away pots and pans. When he was finished he sat down on a chair, which creaked dangerously at the weight. Kurt got off it and stood by the table instead, looking about the room. The room itself had a well-worn look to it, as if somebody had been living here for a long time. All the furniture seemed to be at least 40 years old, with a wood fired oven and a table that was stained from food and use. All the chairs seemed to have been roughly patched up after breaks. There were no modern conveniences, except for a metal box that was humming slightly, which Kurt took to be a fridge, though he didn't know how Zim would have paid for it, and an electric light hanging from some naked wires on the ceiling. There wasn't even any running water at the sink. The entire room had an odd smell, the likes of which Kurt had never come across before. He assumed it was from Zim, or mouldy vegetables, or a mix of both.

He looked further at the table, which had papers piled on it. There were some more propaganda fliers, some of which were covered in a strange writing, other were just left untouched. There was also a large diagram for some sort of electrical equipment, covered with annotations in the same language that was over the posters. Kurt couldn't understand the diagram, and wouldn't have been able to even if it were written in German, or even English or French.

He dropped the diagram quickly when Zim came back up from the basement. 'You've been admiring my STORD plans?' He said with a grin. 'I've been working on it for the past twenty years. It's far more advanced than any of your human technology, but still not good enough for it to work properly.'

Kurt didn't understand what Zim was talking about. 'It's great.' he said, hesitatingly, 'I'm sure you'll get it working one day?'

'Yes. Of course I will. Now, you will go out there, and start turning over the dirt, I have an extra fork in the shed and it will work for you.'

-----

When they finished turning the soil, Kurt was exhausted. He told Zim as much.

Zim looked at Kurt in disgust. 'You're tired after that? It took much longer for the previous one to get tired.' Zim, of course, wasn't tired.

'The previous one?'

'Mmmm.' Zim nodded. 'He got some human illness and died. You won't die, will you, Kurt?' Zim spoke with a slightly threatening tone.

'I'll try not to.' Kurt said, starting to worry again. Maybe he should just take the risk that no Nazi's would come to France, and escape from Zim in the night. He could always try to make for Switzerland if things got too bad, or even head over to America, like the rest of his family did.

Zim nodded. 'You've already eaten today?'He turned and entered the kitchen.

Kurt followed into the small room. 'No,' he was starving, 'I haven't eaten since yesterday. Do you have any food, or water?'

Zim shuddered at the mention of water. 'There's a pump out there somewhere. And I have some mushrooms down in the basement. They've been growing for a while and have started to glow, but I'm sure you'll be able to eat them.'

'Ummm.' Kurt had never heard of any food glowing before, and didn't think it was a good thing. 'I'll just stick with some water. The pumps in the garden?'

But Zim was already gone. He had grown quite fond of the glowing mushrooms, and was starting to crave more of them.

-----

Kurt looked down at Zim disbelievingly. 'This is the bedroom?'

'Yes.' Zim didn't see what was wrong with it; it had a bed, and a mattress, and a blanket. 'You need to sleep, so you will sleep here.'

Kurt looked around. The bed looked rusty and like it would fall apart if he touched it, the mattress was moving, and there was a slight squeaking coming from inside of it, and the blanket looked rotten. 'I can't sleep here! It's not healthy.'

Zim looked around, confused. 'The other one slept here, and he didn't complain. Coughed a lot, but never said anything.' Zim looked around, frowning slightly. 'He only got sick after I moved him in here away from the lab, though. I think he may have been bitten by something.' Zim poked the bed worriedly, pulling away his finger as the bed croaked and leaned to the side dramatically. 'It turned green.'

Kurt took a step closer to the door. 'I'm not sleeping in here. Why don't I just sleep in the armchair?'

'What!?' Zim was shocked 'And have it smell of humaaan? You will sleep in here, and it will be good for you.' Zim folded his arms to end the discussion, leaning back against the bed slightly. He froze as he felt something wet up against the back of his neck, and saw a look of absolute horror cross Kurt's face. 'What is it?'

'It's... It's... It's... A giant...'

'What?!' Zim shouted, leaping away from the bed, and turning around, only to be confronted with the largest, greyest rat he had ever seen, and he had seen quite a few living with GIR and his food scraps.

'RAT!' Kurt screamed, running from the room and slamming the door behind him, leaning on it to lock the rat in. He felt something heavy hit the door behind him.

'Let me out!' Zim screamed, banging on the door. He turned around and saw the rat slowly coming towards him. 'Let me out!'

Kurt opened the door slightly, giving Zim the chance to run through the gap, and for both of them to throw their weight against the door, as the rat hurled itself at them, then started scrabbling at the door.

'Stay there.' Zim told Kurt, running off, and returning 15 minutes later. He was carrying a cylinder filled with a gas, with a hose and nozzle attached to the other end of it. Zim placed the nozzle under the door, and started pumping the gas into the room, and the surrounding hallway, where it stayed settled at about knee height for Kurt, and thigh height for Zim.

They waited for the gas to clear before opening the door. Lying on the floor was the rat. 'Pick it up and throw it away.' Zim ordered.

'I'm not picking it up.' Kurt was disgusted by the notion.

Zim glared at him. 'You will take that thing out of my house, or I will force you to sleep in that room with it.'

Kurt nodded, and picked the rat up and walked over to the window. 'Don't throw it out the window.' Zim said, 'take it outside and put it with the rubbish. Then wash your hands before coming back in. And don't put it on anything.'

Kurt sighed and left the room, going down the stairs and exiting the house, then chucking the body on the rubbish pile. Zim stood at the door to the house and watched to make sure Kurt did it properly. 'Now come back inside. There is a mattress in the car, so you can sleep on that in the living room.'

'There's a car?' Kurt was somewhat amazed by this. He didn't think Zim would have a car.

'Yes, and make sure you get lots of sleep tonight, because we're going to be busy tomorrow.'

'Why?' Surely whatever happens here can't be too much hard work, or at least nothing that requires that much sleep.

Zim grinned. 'Because tomorrow we're getting more chemicals.' Zim shooed him into the living room.

'What?' Kurt asked, but Zim was gone, and only returned with a thin matress and blanket, and left with a click as the door locked behind him.


	9. Chapter 9

Kurt was gripping his car seat in terror. 'How fast are we going!?' He shouted across to Zim.

'Eh?' Zim quirked an antennae, and looked across at Kurt, which scared him even more because it meant Zim didn't have his eyes on the road. 'Just 180.'

'180!' Kurt screamed, '180 what!?'

'Miles, I think. Whatever unit you humans are using currently.' He fumbled through the glove box trying to find the paper he had written everything on.

Kurt screamed and grabbed the wheel. 'Watch the road!' He swerved around the bend that came up suddenly.

'Ha!' Zim shouted. 'I used miles! The faster of your measuring units.'

Kurt closed his eyes and gripped the chair tighter, wondering how Zim had managed to make the old car go this fast. He should have just tried his luck with the Nazis; he might not even die with them.

Zim sneaked a look over at the terrified human and laughed, pushing his foot down further on the accelerator. 'Open your eyes human! I'm slowing down.'

Kurt opened his eyes and screamed. 'Slow down! Slow down!' Then 'Shit!'

'Eh?' Zim looked over at Kurt, 'Human, if you need to empty your bowels, tell Zim!' He didn't want to get his lovely car all dirty with filth.

'No! Didn't you see the policeman back there? He's following us! Stop the car!'

Zim laughed again, 'your police do not worry Zim! They cannot catch me.' He put his foot further down on the accelerator, nudging the car up to 195.

Kurt just put his hands over his eyes, and wished the car had some sort of seatbelt. The car would have to stop sometime, either because Zim stopped it, or they crashed into a tree, and Kurt didn't want to go flying out of the car when it stopped. Instead he grabbed the seat tightly, and prayed for the car ride to be over shortly.

The policeman behind them on the motorbike tried to keep up, but had to stop when he was going so fast that speeding up more would make him lose control of the bike. So instead he wrote the car's license number and make in his book, so they could charge the driver later.

They might even give him a job if he told them how he got the car to go that fast.

* * *

Zim was forced to slow down when they reached their first town. 'Stupid humans, always walking onto the road.' He glared at them as they passed in the street. 'Do you know how much of a mess they make when you hit them?' He asked Kurt, who was enjoying the ride now that they had slowed down.

'No, not really,' he said, paying no attention to what Zim was saying. He really did need to eat something soon. 'Hey, pull over there so I can get a sandwich.' He indicated a small shop on the street.

'I'm not paying for you to eat, human.' Zim growled. He felt edgy and exposed in the town, even though he had put his helmet on when he reached the border.

'I have my own money. Just stop so I can eat something.' His stomach rumbled hungrily at the thought of food.

'Fine.' Zim pulled over onto the kerb. 'Get Zim one too, and don't have any meat on it!' He shouted at the departing humans back, but didn't know if he had heard. Zim sunk lower into the seat and readjusted his driving goggles. He couldn't wait for when he killed all these stinking humans, and the cows. He glared at one that was tethered outside the bakery. He hated cows.

Kurt walked into the warm insides of the bakery. 'Ummm, hello.' he said in strongly accented and badly stilted French. 'I have two sandwiches,' why was he getting Zim a sandwich? It's not like he deserved it, he probably wouldn't pay him back, either. He shrugged and then looked at the selection of sandwiches on offer. 'One of those,' he pointed at the one he wanted, 'and one, ahhh, no meat.'

The bakery owner nodded, and set about making the sandwiches. 'Will you be eating them here?'

'No.' Kurt said, to a disgusted snort from the owner. 'They are picnic.' He wished he had concentrated harder when he was learning French, he sounded like an idiot.

The man nodded, and handed the sandwiches to Kurt. 'That's 20 francs.'

'What? But on sign, it says 8 francs each! I'm not pay 20 for them.'

'I still remember how you Germans butchered this country, just like you're butchering our language right now, and I'm sure most people around here do to, so unless you want your picnic disrupted, you will pay me 20 francs, or you will leave without your sandwiches.'

'Fine.' Kurt didn't want a fight. 'Here's your money.' He tossed it to the man, then grabbed his sandwiches and left.

'Can you believe it!' He asked Zim as he reached the car. 'He over charged me by 4 francs!'

'Where's mine?' Zim asked, ignoring the human's complaints completely. The sandwich got thrown at his head, where he caught it and took a big bite out of it. 'Mmmmmm' He moaned. This was a good sandwich, for a human to have made.

Kurt took a bite out of his sandwich. It was good. He was still overcharged, but he was overcharged for a good sandwich. 'You owe me 10 francs.' He mumbled to Zim through a mouthful of sandwich.

'Or I could kill you when you have completed your job for me.' Zim replied. He wasn't going to owe money to a human. Or anyone, really. There were a few angry Irkens who wanted monies off him back on Irk, but it wasn't his fault they built shops in areas that were destroyed when he was helping Impending Doom 1. They shouldn't look to him for the monies they lost.

'I guess we could call it even, since you're letting me live in your house.' Kurt said after a bit of thought.

Zim snorted but didn't press the point. He wasn't calling it even, because he didn't owe the human money. He put half of his sandwich in the glove compartment and started the car. Only three more hours until they arrived, and Zim could finally get what he needed.

-----

'We're here.' Zim said finally, pulling up outside of a big, walled building. There were smoke stacks on top of the building, but they were cold and there was no smoke coming from them.

'What are we doing here?' Kurt asked. 'It's closed, you can't get in there.'

Zim opened the door. 'We're breaking in. I can't get the chemicals I need when the factory's open, they refuse to give them to me.'

'What!' Kurt screeched in a whisper; he didn't want people to think they were doing anything suspicious. 'I don't want to get arrested again! I won't help you with this.'

'Fine.' Zim said, pulling out a small pistol. He pointed it at Kurts head. 'You will assist me in my acquirement of the chemicals, or I will shoot you and use somebody else.'

Kurt gave a small scream. He didn't want to die; why had he decided to stop at that small house? He should have just gone on to the next town. 'I'll help you, but I don't want to.'

'Good' Zim grinned, 'you will follow me.'

Kurt nodded sadly and got out of the car, trudging slowly after Zim as he went around the wall. Zim was standing about halfway along the wall, by a small metal door. 'I cannot open it, or climb over the walls.' He looked sulky.

Kurt looked at the door, then tried the handle. It didn't open. He shrugged. 'I can't open the door.'

Zim laughed. 'Silly human. You're not opening the door, you're going to help me climb the wall.'

Kurt looked up at the twelve foot tall wall. Then he looked down at Zim. Then he looked back up at the wall. 'Ummm, I don't think we'll be able to make it.'

'Nonsense.' Zim replied. 'Now, kneel down and let me get on your shoulders.'

'And when you get in there, how are you going to get out again?' Kurt was starting to doubt whether Zim had thought this plan through at all.

'Get down on your knees.' Zim repeated. Kurt sighed. If the little green freak got locked in and caught by the guards in the morning, it wasn't his fault. He knelt down. He could look into Zims eyes.

'Get down further.' Zim said, waving a hand at the human step-ladder.

Kurt sighed and got down on his hands and knees, while Zim climbed onto his back. Zim steadied himself by leaning on the wall, then told the human to stand up.

Kurt stood up, but Zim ended up toppling off him as he got up too quickly. 'Stupid human.' He shouted, rubbing his head, 'stand up slower next time.'

Kurt sighed, and got down onto his hands and knees again. When Zim got on his back again he stood up slowly. Zim kept his balance by leaning on his hands, and using them to walk up the walls as Kurt rose. When he was standing up fully Zim grinned. 'Good work, human! We're nearly there.'

Kurt grumbled something under his breath, but Zim ignored him. He removed the spider legs from his PAK, and hoped the bodged up welding job he had used on them would work. They had broken while he was enlarging the cellar underneath the base, and his spares were all in his base in the future.

When he was sure they were dug deeply into the top of the wall, he used them to hoist himself up and onto the top of the wall. He let out a sigh as the spiderlegs held, and looked down at the ground below him. It was all concrete and cement.

He let himself down slowly using the spider legs, but still had to drop down the last metre to the ground. He landed with a grunt on the hard ground, and then looked around for the door. He grinned and swung it open. Previous excursions to this factory had shown him that this door opened from the inside, but not the outside without a key. He looked at Kurt, who had been hoping Zim would disappear so he could leave silently; maybe go to Switzerland, which was close by from here.

'Well, come in human, you still need to carry chemicals for Zim.'

'Are you sure? You don't want me to stand guard out here? So I can look for stuff?'

Zim gave him a blank look. 'Follow me, and we can get the chemicals. Do not be scared, cowardly human; there won't be anyone around until tonight.' He turned and went to the front of the building. Kurt followed him unwillingly.

'How are you planning on getting in? The door wouldn't be left unlocked, you know. Not even the French are that stupid.' He saw Zim pick up a brick that had been lying on the ground. 'Oh. That's illegal. If you get caught, we could both go to jail for a long time!'

Zim glared at the human. 'I am getting sick of your constant whining. Just be quiet and do what I tell you to.' Everything would work much better if people, and Irkens, stopped complaining about what he did, and just did what he told them to. He was a respected Invader! Or would be, anyway.

He threw the brick at the window, and watched the glass shatter. 'Now kneel down so I can get inside.'

Kurt sighed and knelt before the window, grinning in sadistic glee when Zim made a pained noise. He must have caught himself on a piece of glass.

Zim looked around the inside of the building. He was so close to the chemicals he needed! 'Follow me, human.' He said, getting a shocked sound out of Kurt.

'But how am I supposed to..?' He indicated towards the window. It would be very tricky for him to enter through it.

'Just climb in.' Zim answered. Really, these humans would be useless without him to order them around. He grinned as Kurt squeezed his way through, and fell onto the floor with a thud.

Kurt stood up, rubbing his chin. 'Which way first?' he asked sourly. Maybe he could just throw the little monster into a vat of something.

'First? First we go this way.' Zim set off in the direction of the storage rooms, where the chemicals were kept before being moved off to other places.

-- --- -- - - - -

Kurt finished rolling his fifth barrel towards the front of the factory. 'Do you have enough?' He asked, panting and leaning against it after he sat it upright.

Zim looked at the barrels and glass jars that were standing on the floor. 'No, no. This isn't all they have. I know they have more somewhere.' He looked around the room squinting, as if it would give up the secrets of the factory, and tell him where the rest of the chemicals were kept.

'Maybe they haven't finished making them yet?' Kurt suggested, wondering how Zim was expecting to get his barrels out of the factory. He wouldn't be able to lift them out the window, that was for sure.

'Maybe...' Zim looked around the room. 'Or maybe they're kept in storage room "B"! He pointed towards a small red door, then marched across to it, opening it and peering inside. 'Oooooh' he said. There was a small stair way, leading down towards a basement area.

Kurt came up behind Zim and peered over his shoulder. 'I don't think we should go down there.' He said, trying to remove Zim from the entrance. 'Why don't you just get your chemicals into the car, so we can go back home?' Kurt tried against hope to stop Zim from going down into the basement.

'Pah.' Zim said, stepping down into the gloom of the unlit stairwell. 'If the humans have this area here, they must surely keep important stuff down here.' He was now out of Kurt's sight, and travelling further down into the basement.

'Are you sure, Zim?' Kurt followed Zim down, cautiously. 'If they wanted people to come down here, they wouldn't have had a skull and crossbones painted on the door, with "keep out" written in ten different languages.'

'They just have that to keep the humans out. It doesn't apply to ZIM!' He found a lightswitch at the bottom of the stairs, and turned it on.

Kurt blinked in the harsh light. 'There's nothing here. Let's go.' He started heading back towards the top of the stairs.

Zim looked a bit disapointed as well. 'But there must be something here, why else wouldn't they want people to come down?' He walked over to the wall, and started to poke around it.

Kurt rolled his eyes and headed back upstairs. 'I'll be with the chemicals when you get bored and decide to come back up.'

Zim ignored him, and kept on searching the room. It did seem to be rather small for the size of the building above it. He pushed at a stone on the wall, in case it opened up like the walls in the radio dramas he listened to occasionally. One amusing thing the humans could create was fiction. They seemed to spend more time making it then they did other things! And the fiction stories he had found on some of the soldiers bodies. He would never understand their fascination with the naked body.

Zim was just about to give up his search of the room when he saw a small door underneath the stairs. Of course, fiction wasn't real, and hidden doors didn't occur as often in reality as they did in fiction.

He went over the not-so-secret door, and broke open the small lock that was placed on it. It opened quite easily after that, and his eyes lit up at the sight of what was beyond the door.

- -- -- - -- - - -

Kurt was resting lightly against the wall, watching the small door Zim had gone down patiently. How long did it take to realise there was nothing down in that room?

He was about to go down and get Zim out of there when he heard the elevator start up. He had noticed it on the wall when he first came in, but hadn't given it a second thought. But now it was going! There must have been somebody else in the building with them, and now he was going to get caught! He ducked down behind the scanty cover offered by a big barrel, that they would surely notice as it hadn't been there when they had arrived, and waited to get caught.

He was shaking slightly when the door opened and a beaming Zim was standing in the middle of the doors, with the rest of the elevator filled with bottles and jars of chemicals.

'Zim!' Kurt shouted, 'What is this?'

Zim's grin got larger. 'I found all the good stuff. Help me get it out here.' He started dragging a bottle that was almost as big as he was.

Kurt raced over and picked up a second bottle. 'None of this stuff was down there when I saw it.' He said, only then realising that the lift was on the opposite side of the building to the little room. 'Where was it all?'

'In the room underneath the stairs.' Zim was starting to feel smug about the entire thing. 'I told you it would be down there.'

Kurt ignored Zim, and continued to empty the elevator of the goods. When the elevator was completely clear, Kurt looked around at the bottles of chemicals lining the floor. 'How are you going to get them out of the building?' e asked Zim. 'I'm not lifting them out of the window.' He added.

Zim quirked an eye-brow-ridge in Kurts general direction. 'I'll open the door.' He said, bringing out a key, and inserting it into the lock.

Kurt's mouth opened in astonishment. 'Where did you get that?' Why didn't he just open the door and let Kurt in to begin with?

'It was in that little room over there.' Zim pointed towards a small room. 'I'll also be able to drive the car right up to the front door, so you don't have far to go with the heavy bottles. Stay there while I get it.' He left the building, opened the big gates at the front of the walls, and drove the car inside. He parked it right beside the front doors. 'Bring the chemicals out now, human.' He stood up in the driver's seat to oversee Kurt's job, and order him around as he felt was necessary.

Kurt obeyed the instruction as well as he could, but after the fifth time Zim ordered him to do something impossible, he snapped. 'Why don't you do it yourself, then, and let me boss you around from inside the car?'

Zim laughed at him. 'Because you're just a stupid human. You wouldn't have any idea of how to fit these things properly.

Kurt scowled at Zim. 'Fine' He said, sulkily, and sat down on the ground, feeling like a little kid throwing a temper tantrum. 'You can do it yourself if you're so great.'

'How dare you speak to me that way!? If you refuse to behave, I will have to leave you here, and you can answer to the human authorities, and go to jail for a long time.'

'No, I won't. I'll tell them about you, and you can go to jail for a long time, or where-ever weird little green monster things are taken.'

'You wouldn't dare.' Zim pulled out the gun and pointed it at Kurt's head. 'If you do not start packing again, I will shoot you right now.'

Kurt looked up at the gun, slightly scared. 'I'm not going to start packing again until you show me some respect. You're treating me worse than the rest of the Germans did. I'll probably end up dying anyway, but I don't want to die being treated like a slave, or an animal.'

Zim growled and lowered the gun. 'I can't lift those big barrels into the car. You have to do it for me.'

'Say "please."' Kurt hoped he wasn't pushing it too far.

Zims antennae lowered in barely contained anger. 'Please.' He said bitterly, wanting to put a bullet through the head of the stupid human. If he wasn't still needed...

'Okay, then. Let me pack these away, by myself, and then we can go.' He started packing the car, and placing bottles into secure positions. When he was done Zim handed him a tarp to cover the chemicals with, which Zim tied on using ropes.

'Didn't that go so much easier?' Kurt asked Zim when they were finished.

Zim drove them back to the house in silence.


	10. Chapter 10

Sorry about the delay, but life got in the way.

As this is set during world war two, and we are coming up to the start of the war, there will be themes in this chapter, and subsequent chapters, than may disturb or offend some readers. If you are easily upset, please don't read further. I shall try to keep things toned to a minimum, but some future (as yet unwritten) chapters may be placed in the M section for safety.

I do not endorse any of the anti-Semitic or pro-Nazi views shown by any characters, and do not agree with genocide for any reasons.

* * *

After they returned back to Zim's house, he disappeared into the basement and didn't appear at all for six months, unless it was to eat, yell at Kurt to get or make food, or yell at Kurt about what to do in the gardens at the time.

In that time, Kurt felt very relaxed. He had developed a daily routine, and the radio kept him informed about the situation in Germany, while still keeping him safe.

Zim spent the time working on the STORD, and various things he needed to be able to work on the STORD. He had slowly been working on plastics, wearing an old gas mask to stop himself from inhaling the fumes. It took him weeks to make each necessary part, but in those six months he had completed more for the technical side of the STORD than he had done in the past 20 years. Zim finally emerged from the basement when he ran out of chemicals.

'Kurt!' He shouted, 'I am a genius!' He needed to tell someone, after all, he had nearly built a time machine from scratch using nothing but primitive materials.

Kurt looked up from the table with dull eyes. 'Poland's just been invaded by the Nazis.'

Zim was confused, 'so?' Why should he care if Poland was invaded? Invasion was good, and a necessary part of any war.

'War's going to break out.'

'Yes.' Zim said. He had finally remembered a bit more about this time period. 'And the entire planet will be dragged into war, killing millions of humans in various ways. And their leader shall kill himself rather than let the enemy take him.'

Kurt looked disbelieving. 'What are you talking about? Poland's just been invaded, you can't think to know all that just from this.'

'Of course Zim knows. The Skool taught me, when I had to learn pathetic, human history. You humans would make fine cannon fodder for the Irken army when it invades this pitiful planet.' Zim couldn't wait for that day, when he could look down on the humans and watch them all burn.

'History class? Do you come from the future?' Kurt asked, 'What happens when the war ends?'

Zim shrugged. 'Some sort of exile to South America, or maybe a trial.' He scratched his head. 'I think there was a motorbike involved.'

'Who wins?' Kurt was desperate. He couldn't live if the Nazis won. They would kill him; and his family if they were caught. Luckily they had taken the opportunity to emigrate to America when it had been given. Kurt wished he hadn't stayed behind to look after their neighbours, who hadn't been so lucky.

Zim frowned. 'The Americans did, with a little help from the English army.' Zim had, of course, learnt his history in a rather poorly funded American school, so his knowledge was rather biased.

Kurt shuddered at the thought. The Americans were affecting neutrality, so the war would have to get bad for them to go and fight, apparently, against Germany. He leaned back and switched the radio on, waiting for the next news announcement. Zim sat at the table, too, and ate a biscuit.

After a few minutes a stressed sounding announcer appeared on the radio. 'The cowardly nations of Britain and France have just declared war on the glorious German Empire. The fuhrer has promised that any war started will be over by Christmas, and the glorious Third Reich shall bring peace and prosperity to the German people.' The news report cut out to sounds of the German national anthem. Kurt leaned over to turn it off in disgust, but Zim smacked his hand away, and instead changed the channel, to listen to what the French were saying about the declaration of war.

-----

After the declaration of war, the radio was almost never off. Kurt listened to it while working in the garden or cleaning the house, or whatever chores Zim had put him up to. Zim spent most of his days in the basement, fussing over the STORD, and making sure everything was right. He listened to the radio at nights before it cut off to static, and then went back down to the basement to fiddle with the machine until the next night.

A few weeks later Kurt knocked on the door to the basement. He hated going into the place; it stank of metal, chemicals and burnt rubber, but a major advance had been made in the war, and he thought that Zim would yell at him if he wasn't told, and was instead left to find out for himself. 'Zim?' he shouted, lifting the hatch slightly.

'What?' Zim shouted back. He didn't have time for any of the human's complaints or noises; some wiring had come undone and needed to be replaced delicately. 'What do you want?'

Kurt swallowed. Zim sounded grumpy. 'Poland's fallen to the Germans.' He called out, then closed the hatch and went back to dusting. Zim grunted in acknowledgement of the human, then ignored him for the rest of the day.

When Zim came out of the basement, the news was on. 'Celebrations are occurring around the street, as our great father has managed to expand the great German empire by defeating Poland.'

Zim glared at Kurt. 'When did this happen?'

'Just this morning. I told you about it.'

'You did not!' Zim shouted. 'You lie! There was no mention of this!' Zim stood up and pointed dramatically towards Kurt.

Kurt sighed. Why was Zim so... _stupid_? 'I told you earlier, but you ignored me.'

Zim 'hmmmmmmm'ed, and narrowed his eyes at Kurt. 'Maybe you're hiding something from Zim?'

'Huh?' Kurt was surprised. Where had that come from?

'Zim knows what you're doing. You're telling the humans about me, aren't you? You're telling them, and then they're going to come and take me apart, and YOU!' He pointed again, dramatically. 'You, with your talking, and your complaining. You want to take Zims work!'

'Zim?' Kurt asked, starting to get worried. 'Are you okay? Maybe you've been spending too much time in the basement. Why don't you stop working for a bit.., come outside and breathe some fresh air.'

That turned out to be the worst thing to say. 'That's what you _would_ want! You want me to go outside, so that all the other stinking humans can find me! Why? Do you want the house!? No.' Zim's voice lowered. 'You want my STORD. Admit it! You want my beautiful STORD!'

Kurt put his hands out placatingly, 'Zim, I don't want your house, or whatever you've got in the basement. Just calm down, and eat something, then you can go outside, and get some fresh air. It'll be good for you, rather than being stuck in the basement. I'll even come with you, so you can see I'm not doing anything wrong.'

Zim was still suspicious of Kurt, but agreed to going outside. It was getting colder, and darker. Zim knew that the rain would start soon, and then he wouldn't be able to go outside at all. He sighed and looked up at the sky. There was a lack of cloud cover that allowed him to see the stars, one of the few good things about this planet and hemisphere was that Irk was still visible, even if it was just a pale dot within a cluster of stars named after some stupid human snack food. Not that any respectable snack food eater would call it a snack food. Just another feeble human attempt at something the Irkens had done much better.

He took a deep breath of air that wasn't polluted with chemicals or burnt metal. He started to feel a bit calmer. Maybe he had been spending too much time in the basement. One of the safety instructions taught when he was a smeet had been: "always work in a well-ventilated environment", which the basement definitely wasn't. Maybe he would air it out tomorrow, and fix whatever the human had been doing to his garden. There seemed to be sticks in the ground, and a strange clucking noise coming from the corner. A noise that sounded slightly familiar.

'Are those chickens?' He asked walking over to a part of the garden that had been fenced off from the rest.

'I used my own money to get them. And they produce eggs, and when the current chickens hatch, we'll have more for meat, or to sell, or...' He trailed off and watched Zim, who was appraising the chickens, and muttering to himself. 'What are you planning for them?'

'Huh?' Zim was distracted from his thoughts. 'Oh, nothing. But they may come in useful when I have to test my STORD.' He looked at the chickens again. 'They will be very useful as, ah, guinea pigs.'

Kurt looked at Zim. 'But they're my chickens; you can't just put them in that thing you're making.'

Zim glared at Kurt. 'I could put you in, instead. You might even end up on earth'

Kurt decided that he could spare a few chickens, rather than land on some inhospitable alien planet, or, even worse, a planet with more Zims. A few minutes later Kurt went back inside, leaving Zim alone in the dark. It was starting to cool down, and he preferred the warm inside.

Zim stayed outside, and lay down on the grass, looking up at the stars. Soon they would all belong to the glorious Irken Empire. At least the Irken Empire wouldn't go the same way as all the humans empires, that were brought down eventually by their traitorous enemies (traitorous enemies, did that even work?). Like the Hitler-humans empire. It would be crushed by the allies, and all the dreams of a united planet would disappear.

Zim sighed. The thought of WWII reminded him of hi-skool classes. The concentration camps, the Hitler youth, the expansion, the rallies and the unquestionable leader. It had all made him very home-sick.

He opened his eyes and stared up at the stars. Then the humans had been shown footage of Hitler dancing in front of the Eiffel tower, and the students had laughed. Zim had been appalled; how dare they laugh at him, and the stupid human propaganda. It had made him sick, and also made him wonder. Did the conquered aliens laugh at footage of his Tallests dancing, or of them relaxing after a hard day's work of commanding the empire? He hoped not, but knew that the filthy aliens would do anything to try and make the Tallests look stupid, and themselves not.

Zim blinked and realised something. He rewound the footage he had played in his head. Hitler was dancing in front of the pointy statue because he had conquered the French. He was in France, which produced the French. He got up and walked inside. 'Kurt!' He shouted out, 'We are in France.'

Kurt looked up from the newspaper. 'Yes.'

'With the big, pointy tower thing.'

'Yes.'

'Hmmmm.' Zim turned around and went back outside. Kurt tried to read the paper for another five minutes, but then followed Zim outside. 'You know we're in France, why did you ask?'

'This country is invaded by the Germans.' Zim had thought this through. 'They will want to take me apart if they find me.' Concentration camps were really only a good idea when your enemies were inside them. Zim looked up at Kurt. 'I won't be taken apart! Not by you humans!'

Kurt sat down next to where Zim was standing. 'They'd kill me, too.' He said.

Zim looked at him. 'I don't care about you. I have to protect my Squeedily-spooch.' He clasped his hands over his stomach.

Kurt looked at Zim in disgust. 'How can you only care about yourself, aren't you even worried about what might happen to me?'

Zim shook his head. 'What are you? You're just some other human, they wouldn't care about killing you any more than they'd care about killing some other human.'

'No. I'm a jew.'

Zim gave a start, then started examining Kurt harder. Finally he came to the conclusion that Kurt was lying to gain attention. He told him so.

'You think I would lie about this!?' He couldn't believe Zim. Who would lie about it, when you could be killed for it?

'Yes. You have the yellow hair and blue eyes that are highly regarded by the German leader. You have a normal, though hideous, nose, not like the hook shown on the pictures, and you are not carrying a bag full of gold. You are not a Jew.'

Kurt wondered if Zim was really this stupid, then decided that no, he was just ill-informed. Zim carried on, 'and even if you are a Jew, you can just lie about it, and tell them you're not. You humans are good at lying, so it should be easy for you.'

Kurt wondered if Zim understood anything about the planet he claimed to have lived on for about 1/4 of a century. 'You think it would be that easy? They'd check, and find I don't have a passport, or-' Zim waved his worries away.

'Humans are stupid. They won't notice. I will hide in the basement when they come, and nobody will ever know I'm here.' Then he glared at Kurt, 'unless you tell them.'

Kurt assured Zim he would never tell anyone that an alien was hiding in the basement, then changed the topic and lay back to look at the stars, while Zim lectured him about what lived where, and how hideous they were.

-----

'Where are you going now?' Zim asked, as Kurt made for the door.

'Just to town, to pick up some stuff.'

Zim narrowed his eyes at Kurt. 'We have enough food, and I have no need for more metals. Where are you going? And why?' His suspicions had been roused. 'PLUS, it's 5:00 at night. No shops would be open.'

'Fine. I'm going to the Christmas ball. I asked a girl to go with me, and she's expecting me to pick her up at 6:00.'

Zim narrowed his eyes further. 'A ball? Why have I not heard of this?'

'I didn't think you'd be interested.' He had a ludicrous image of Zim in his battered helmet and moth-eaten coat, dancing the waltz in his head for a few minutes. 'You're not, are you?'

'Of course not!' Zim was shocked the human would even consider it. 'But I don't like you going places without telling me. How did you meet this "girl"?'

Kurt sighed. He could see he wasn't going anywhere until Zims questions were answered. 'I met her at the shop. She only just arrived here, so I said I'd show her around, help her out, from one German to another.'

Zim considered this for a few moments. 'And you want to go to the ball with her, and dance with her.' Zim remembered his own one experience of going to a dance. At the end most of the filthy children had gone either to each other's homes, or into cars, and done foul, primitive mating rituals with each other. Even Dib had gone home with Gretchen, with Zim following, of course. He had learnt quite a bit about human mating for that, but had felt the urge to wash his eyes out with dirty water from what he had seen.

'Yes.' Kurt didn't care what Zim said next, he was going to the ball anyway.

'You are not to bring her here, or engage in filthy, squelchy mating rituals with her.'

'Okay.' Kurt was sure he could prevent himself from doing either of those things. 'Can I take the car?' it was just an innocent question, but got a strong reaction from Zim.

'No! You will not touch my car! I know what you'd do in there, and I will not have it in my car! Not in my clean car, with your filthy, human germs.'

'Okaaaay.' Zim really didn't want his car to get dirty. 'I'll be off, then.' He turned and put his hand on the door knob.

'Be back before midnight, and don't bring that girl with you!'

Kurt left, mumbling to himself.

Nine hours later, Kurt and his girl returned to Zims house, where they proceeded to break the last of Zims instructions, much to his displeasure, as he was the one who would have to do the cleaning the next morning.

Or at least, be the one to yell at Kurt about breaking his rules as Kurt cleaned up after himself.

After the Christmas ball, Kurt started spending more time with his girlfriend, whose name, as Zim eventually learnt, was Lena. Zim never met her, and she was not welcome in his house, but he heard her occasionally, when Kurt disobeyed him and brought her home with him. She had what Zim took to be a pleasant voice, and Kurt was absolutely smitten by her.

'I'm going to marry her.' Kurt said, one cold February morning.

'No, you're not.' Zim replied, completely serious.

Kurt looked dumbfounded. 'What did you say?'

'I said; "no, you're not." You will not marry this Lena female. I won't let you.' Zim dipped a slice of toast in Kurt's runny egg yolk, and watched it drip off.

'You won't let me?' Zim was now going too far.

'No. If you marry her, you won't be here to do the house work, or get supplies from the town. Instead you'll be living with Lena, and doing her work.'

Kurt looked at Zim. Was he jealous of Lena for taking up all his time? He knew he had been seething for a while, but didn't realise what about. 'Are you jealous?'

'What!?' Zim was shocked. 'How dare you accuse Zim of this horrible lie!?' Of course he wasn't jealous; he just didn't want his helper to be taken away from him. 'I will be happy for you and your "Lena" when you have hideous wormlings frolicking at your feet.'

'I love her, and I'm going to marry her, and you'll be left all alone again. Isn't that what you're scared of, being left alone again, with your dirty pots and floor, and not being able to get food in winter.'

Zim glared at him. The tension in the air between them was biting. 'And will she be happy when she learns you're a Jew and not the "rugged Aryan" that she thinks she's with?' Zim knew Kurt hadn't breached the subject.

'I'm sure she'll be fine with it.' Kurt said, though he lacked conviction.

'Really? And you think she'll remove her swastika and stop telling those jokes when she's drunk?'

Kurt didn't reply, so Zim continued on. 'You know the jokes I mean. There's that one, she always tells it, how does it go? -'

'Shut up.' Kurt glared at Zim hatefully. 'She can change. She doesn't understand, but I can teach her.' Kurt got out through gritted teeth.

Zim grinned. He knew the human wasn't fooling itself. 'You really think that? You're even stupider than I thought. Did you know she salutes when she hears Hitler talking on the radio? Or maybe you haven't heard her call out "Adolf" when you're in bed toge-' The rest of what Zim was saying was blocked out by a fist colliding with his jaw.

'How dare you! Stupid, stinking HUMAN!' Zim got off the floor and rubbed his jaw. 'You dare to assault Zim!? Your master!?' He received another punch to the jaw for that comment.

'No wonder you're still alone. Nobody would be able to put up with you for more than a year. Not even your own kind.'

Zim didn't even shout at the human as he turned his back. He just picked up the mug of lukewarm tea, and threw it at the humans back, hitting him in the shoulder as he left the room. Kurt ignored the projectile, and left the house, slamming the door as he went.

Zim stood alone in the middle of the now tea-stained kitchen, and tried not to let what the human had said dig too much deeper in. Of course he didn't believe it. Of course not.

Kurt came back five hours later, and found Zim cleaning up the kitchen. 'Why are you here?' Zim grunted angrily, and he scrubbed at a very clean tile.

Kurt took a deep breath. 'I'm sorry.' He said to Zim. 'You're right, of course.'

'Of course Zim is right. She said no to your marriage?' he asked smugly.

'No, we're getting married in Summer, but I think you might be right about her.' He didn't mention how hesitant she had seemed when she agreed to marry him. Or how she hadn't agreed until she had asked him if he was still staying at that inventors house until they were married. Those things didn't need saying, not to Zim, anyway.

'Of course Zim is right. Zim has been studying you humans for longer than you've been alive.' He handed the cloth to Kurt. 'You can continue cleaning the kitchen. I'll be up to check how clean it is in an hour. If it's not clean enough you will do it again.' Zim exited to the basement, and Kurt sighed. The kitchen was sparkling as it was, but if he wanted to stay here until he was marrried, he would have to keep on Zims good side. He set about wiping a non-existent cobweb out of the corner.


	11. Chapter 11

When I get few reviews, I forget to update.

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For the next few months, Zim's house was not a happy one. Zim and Kurt had almost constant clashes whenever the subjects of "Marriage" or "Leni" were brought up, and there was increasing tension between the German and French nations, which led to increased tension between Kurt and the village.

These tensions were brought to a head on the 10th of May (in the beginning of the year?), when Germany invaded France.

-----

Captain (Hauptmann) Kreiner was having a good day. The invasion of France was going well, and they had finally reached the town where an apparently eccentric, yet genius, inventor lived. The Fuhrer must believe that such a person existed, because he had sent an agent in to assess the situation. The Captain was meeting the agent today, to see if the information was valuable or useful.

He saw the spy coming in from the distance, and stood up. 'What news do you have?'

She saluted. 'I have infiltrated the house of the scientist, and the information received appears to be accurate. I have personally seen an electrical refrigerator and a radio in operation in the house, but the house itself is not connected to any external forms of electricity, or a generator that requires petrol. The car driven by the owner of the house also appears to not need any oil or fuel to run.'

The captain nodded at her information. 'Very good. And do you have an identity for the scientist?'

She looked about herself conspiratorially, and leaned in closer to the Captain/Sargeant. 'I saw the owner of the house once, when he thought I was sleeping. He seems to be dwarfish in height, but I didn't see a nose on him, and his eyes weren't the normal shape or size.'

The captain shrugged. 'Possibly just a side effect of some disease. If he's no good to us, he'll end up with a bullet in his head anyway.'

Leni nodded, not convinced by the captains explanation. 'Return to your post in the house. We will be there at 16:00 hours this evening. Do you think extra force will be needed to bring in this inventor?'

Leni thought hard. 'It may be required. My contact has mentioned that the inventor has armed himself, in case anything like this happens. I do not know what weapons he has armed himself with, but it would be best to be prepared.'

The captain nodded. He had been given strict instructions from Herr Himmler himself that the inventor was to be brought in alive, and as unharmed as possible. Kreiner accepted these instructions, and wasn't about to risk his life, or position, by getting the inventor killed. 'And what of the contact?'

'He is harmless. You would do best to not waste a bullet in killing him.'

Kreiner looked up at her, with a slight smile on his face. 'You're not developing feelings for him, are you?'

Leni stood up straighter. 'No, Sir! My first and only love is for the German nation and the Fuhrer.' She saluted again, just to show her devotion.

Kreiner tried to stop his smile. He knew a denial when he heard one. 'You are dismissed. Go and wait for us to arrive.'

She saluted once more and left. Kreiner sighed and shuffled about some papers on his makeshift desk. Maybe he could get some leave when the inventor was brought in. That would be good.

-----

Zim was down in the basement, fiddling with the car motor. He had figured out how it worked, and played around with it so it worked better, when he had first stolen it, but now he was fiddling just to give him something to do. That stupid female was here again, and he didn't want to see her again. That first time had been enough; to see her there, with her eyes open, sleeping soundly. It sickened Zim He couldn't stand humans, and his enforced exile among them in an even more primitive time than the one he had arrived in wasn't endearing him to them any more.

He cursed as he dropped the spanner he wasn't using, and bent down to pick it up. He blamed that stupid human, banging doors open, and shouting. His basement wasn't soundproof, so he had to put up with any noises that crept down to him.

Zim dropped the spanner again, this time because a gunshot had gone off. This was something worth investigating. He put on his helmet and old coat, grabbed the pistol he had removed from a body during the first war, and climbed up the stairs to investigate.

Slowly opening the trapdoor, Zim saw no boots on the floor of his kitchen, so he quickly exited, locking the basement door after him. He was then pulled up and into the air by a pair of arms wrapping him around his underarms, and dragging his arms out to the side. He immediately started kicking against his captor, and was rewarded by a grunt when he hit one of their shins. When Zim realised the human wouldn't let him go, he aimed the pistol back and behind himself.

'Uh uh uh. We can't have untrained children playing with guns.' Zim saw the pistol getting taken from his hand. He tightened his grip on it, but kept his face pointed downwards. He so wanted to glare at the human, though, and see which one it was that dared to condescend to Zim! Instead of glaring, he just started shouting. He was good at shouting.

'You won't get Zim! I'll destroy you all! One by one! Then I'll make you into rope! And you can all be used to hang your leaders! Because you're all going to fail! All you pitiful humans will be crushed by the Ir-' he realised what he was shouting, and changed quickly, 'allies! The allied forces will crush your attempts to take over the world! And then I will be able to defeat all of you easier!'

The gun was tugged on harder. He was really noisy for a little guy. 'You should let it go now, or somebody might get hurt.' There was a scuffle in the doorway, and Zim saw a pair of pants that belonged to Kurt get dragged into the room by a uniformed pair of legs.

Zim grinned. Did they think he cared about them killing the other human? He ventured this question towards them, and kept his grip tight on the gun, trying to point it at the voice that was talking.

The human who had been talking noticed the lack of gun getting dropped, and instead grabbed Zims wrist, squeezing it tightly in a grip that suggested ape rather than human.

Zim felt the bones or his wrist rubbing together uncomfortably, and was forced to loosen his grip on the weapon, dropping it to his captor's feet.

'Isn't that better?' the voice asked. 'Children should always do as they're told, or they'll just get into trouble for it. But you'll learn that soon.' Zim hung limply in the humans arms. He didn't want to admit it, but he was almost scared of what might be coming up. A terrible feeling of dread settled over him, as he remembered all the experiments Miss Bitters had made them to look at and learn about. He was starting to understand why Zita had vomited during the lessons.

Two more people walked into the room, which was now starting to get a bit crowded. 'You were right Leni, he is short.' One of the new people said. Zim noted a pair of skirted legs standing next to the man who just entered. Zim stated struggling again, he would not let these humans take him. Not to be tortured, not by them, not before he even got here! He felt the human who was holding him's grip loosen, and put extra effort into fighting him off.

Captain Kreiner sighed. He had been having such a good day, too. Now he had to put up with a struggling dwarf. 'Soldier, remove his helmet.' He wanted to see if it really was as deformed as Leni had suggested during the meeting, or if it was just an effect of the dark.

The soldier with the apes grip pulled Zims helmet off, ignoring his rather loud protests, resulting in gasps from the surrounding troops, and the guard holding Zim almost dropped him in shock.

Zim glared at the surrounding humans. There was a bulky looking human holding Zims helmet against his chest in shock. There was a gangly, red haired human, looking at Zim interestedly, standing next to the blonde female traitor that Zim should have killed when she entered the house. She was looking anywhere except for Zim and Kurt, who was still in the hold of a guard, and was trying to look surprised at the revelation of Zims non-human-ness. The guard holding him was looking away indifferently. He didn't want to remember anything, in case what he was seeing would get him killed.

Captain Kreiner moved towards Zim slowly. 'That's amazing.' He put out a hand and moved it towards Zims face, who flinched away from the hand, but couldn't escape. The hand touched his cheek, and stroked the skin there. 'It feels so soft.' Zim closed his eyes tightly against the intrusion into his personal space, but one of them was forced open, and he found himself staring right at the red-haired human, who eventually stood up.

'Take it back to the camp. It'll have to be guarded before we can send it back to Germany.' He pointed towards the soldier holding Kurt. 'And you can stay on guard at this house. Make sure that he doesn't contact anyone, either.' He pointed towards Kurt.

'You're leaving him here?' The ape-grip soldier asked.

Kriener shrugged. 'He's not what we came here for. Move out.' he turned around and left the kitchen, with Leni, the two soldiers and Zim following him. The other soldier and Kurt were left behind.

-----

After a bumpy car ride Zim was tied to a chair in a tent in the German soldiers' camp. He looked at the one nervous guard who was standing watch over him.

'Don't look at me.' he said, trying to keep the fear out of his voice. He was quite scared of Zim, and wished he had been given a different job, instead of coming to capture a scientist. He had been told the job would be easy, not that he would have to stand guard over some creature afterwards.

Zim grinned at the scared soldier, showing off all his teeth as he did. Human soldiers had no backbone. A good soldier would not show fear in front of a prisoner. 'Are you scared, _hu_-man?' Zim asked, trying to open his PAK without the soldier noticing.

'N-no.' The soldier said, unconvincingly. 'What's that?!' He asked, noticing the spider leg that Zim was trying to use to cut his bonds.

'Nothing.' Zim replied, edging the spider leg out of sight.

The soldier raised his rifle. 'What are you doing? I can shoot you, you know!'

'You can't shoot me.' Zim said. 'Don't you know bullets can't hurt me?' Zim hoped the soldier didn't call his bluff. He did not want to get shot again.

The soldiers' gun dipped slightly, then rose again. 'You're lying.'

Zim paused slightly. He was slowly loosening the cuff tying his right hand to the chair. 'Your superiors wouldn't want me harmed. I'm sure they'd be very angry if I got hurt.'

'Not really. They don't want you killed, but they also don't want you to escape.' He pointed the gun in the direction of Zims leg. 'Stop what you're doing or I'll shoot you.'

Zim sighed and slowly returned his spiderleg to it's position inside his PAK. 'What was that thing?' The soldier asked.

'What thing?' Zim returned, not willing to give these humans any information about himself.

'That thing. It came from that metal case on your back.' The soldier took a few tentative steps towards Zim, still keeping the gun pointed at him.

'No it didn't.' Zim replied, not wanting the human to get too close to him, or his PAK.

'Yes it did. What else do you have in there?' He reached out with his gun and bumped the nozzle against Zims PAK.

'Nothing.' Now it was Zims turn to be frightened. What if the human shot him? He would have to kill the human if it got too close to him, and hope it didn't shoot him in the PAK first.

Any potential problems were stopped from happening by the entrance of Captain Kreiner. He looked at the two of them. 'Lower your gun.' He told the soldier, who dipped it fractionally, so that it was no longer pointing at Zims chest.

He walked over to Zim and squatted down in front of his chair. 'I have informed my superiors about your capture, and I must say they were quite interested.' He stood back up, and looked slightly sad. 'They were so interested you will be taken away tomorrow, for locations unknown. Until then, however, I want to talk to you.' Zim looked at the human. He didn't trust him at all. Not even when he pulled up a chair and sat it down in front of Zim. 'So,' he asked, 'what are you?'

Zims antennae lowered slightly. Did this human really expect him to answer? 'You think that I will tell you?' He asked, slightly put off. This was not what he had been taught Nazi's were like.

'Yes. Please?'

Zim frowned again. 'I'm not telling you. Why should I tell a pitiful human about the glorious Irken race? You're all too stupid to deserve such knowledge.'

'So you're an Irken? I've never heard of them before. Where do you come from? Is it Scandinavia?'

'Eh? No.' Zim didn't even know what Scandinavia was. 'Who are you?'

Kreiner laughed. 'Of course, I forgot my manners. I am Captain Herman Kreiner. And who are you?'

This entire thing was just confusing Zim no end. 'I am Zim.' He couldn't even get up the passion to scream his name. What was with this human? 'Why are you so interested in Zim?'

'Because I've always just had an interest in old folk tales. I never thought they'd actually be true, though. Just stories to get children to behave. It's so great to finally get to meet someone that proves they're true.'

Zim couldn't believe it. He had travelled back in time more than 60 years, and found another Dib. 'You want to autopsy me!' Zim screeched. Dib in any time couldn't be good, especially one as primitive as this.

'Autopsy you? Now, why would I want to do that?' Kreiner looked confused. 'I just want to know more about you, and all of your lot. What are you, where are you from?'

Zim frowned. The human would probably die before the war was over, anyway, and soldiers didn't have a mind outside of the instructions given to them by their superiors, so... 'Zim is from Irk.'

'Irk?' Kreiner had never heard of such a place, though he did have a very limited knowledge of geography. 'Is that in Turkey?'

'Of course Irk is not in some stupid poultry bird!' Zim couldn't believe the nerve of the human. 'Irk is in space, and far better than any stupid, stinking bird!'

'In space?' That was interesting. 'So you're some sort of alien?' Kreiner thought about this more. 'You must come from so far away! It would have taken you centuries to get to earth! How long have you been here?'

Zim saw that the questions wouldn't end. It WAS another Dib. Another filthy human, grubbing around for information that they didn't deserve, and shouldn't be told. 'Zim will not say any more.' He started up a sulking act, though it was hard to do while being tied to a chair.

Kreiner shrugged. 'Okay.' Then he reached out, and stroked Zims antennae.

'Hey!' Zim shouted. 'Don't touch me there! Get your filthy pig-hands off Zim! Don't touch me!' He tried to struggle away from the hand, but, again, was restricted by being tied to the chair.

Kreiner ignored Zim, and ran his hand back the other way, getting a shudder out of Zim. 'It's like it's covered in small hairs.' He ran his hand back up, and Zim shivered and twitched away.

'Don't touch me.' He growled, trying to get rid of the feeling of the human touching him. He flattened his antennae against his head, and glared at the human. 'You can't touch me there.'

'Okay. shhh, it's alright.' He stroked Zims cheek, trying to calm him down, but not suceeding.

'Don't touch me, don't touch me, don't touch me. Get your filthy hands off me!' Zim lashed out, trying to get the human with his teeth.

Kreiner whipped his hand away from Zim as fast as he could. 'Okay, okay. No touching.' He watched as Zim slumped further down into his chair, making him seem even smaller than he was. 'Are all of your species as short as you are?'

Zim tried not to let the insult faze him. He had had much worse from the other soldiers when he was in training. He wanted to refuse to say anything, but then what if the human touched him again? Zim was rather stuck in what to do. 'Heights... vary.' He sighed. But he didn't want the human to touch him again. 'Most don't get much shorter than me.' Only drones were shorter than Zim, and some of those were taller than him.

'Have any of them come to earth before you?' He wanted to know if the old folk tales were based on aliens.

Zim laughed. 'Why would any Irken want to come to this stinking, filthy planet?'

'Oh. What about other species?'

Zim shrugged. 'I dunno. They might've.' He didn't care about what other species did.

Kreiner sat there for another five minutes, just looking at Zim. It creeped Zim out slightly, but he preferred the looking to the questions, or the touching. Especially the touching. Eventually Kreiner got up. 'I'll see you again tomorrow, before you leave. There'll be another guard coming in in 15 minutes or so to take over for you.' He directed towards the soldier. 'Try not to hurt him if you don't have to, but none of us want to get on the wrong side of the higher-ups.' He looked at Zim again, and said, 'if you get hurt it's your own fault for trying to escape. Please don't try, because I don't want to see you get hurt.' Then he left the tent.

-----

True to his word, captain Kreiner returned to Zims tent fifteen minutes before the truck to carry him out was due to arrive. He sat on the chair in front of Zim, and asked, 'did you sleep well last night?'

'I don't sleep.' Zim replied. He may not have slept, but he still hadn't had a comfortable night. The chair was hard, and he couldn't move to get comfortable without the ape-human pointing a gun at him. And he had had the butt of the rifle slammed into his stomach when he had tried to stretch out. So, while he hadn't slept, he hadn't had a comfortable night, either.

'Oh.' He looked at the soldier standing guard. 'You can leave the tent. I have a gun, so I can protect myself if he tries anything.' The soldier didn't think it was a good idea to leave Zim alone, but accepted the captains orders anyway. He went outside, and removed a cigarette for a quick smoke.

The captain looked around to make sure the soldier was completely engaged in his smoke before turning back to Zim. 'They're not going to be nice to you when you get to where ever you're going.'

'I know that.' Zim said. How could he not?

'I don't want you to be hurt too badly, and I'm sure you don't either. Just try and please them. Don't do anything that could upset them, or they'll make you pay for it.'

Zim wanted to reply that he had been trained to withstand torture, but couldn't quite say it. He had been getting more and more scared the closer it came to the time he was to be collected. Zim kept quiet so he didn't end up voicing his fear.

'If you just keep them happy, you might even be allowed to live after the war is over.' Kreiner continued. He stroked the side of Zims head. 'Something as special as you shouldn't be killed.'

'Then let me go.' Zim said. 'If you don't want me to die, let me go.'

Kreiner smiled. 'I would love to let you go, but then they would kill me, and I don't want to die either.' He looked at his watch. 'I would love to stay for longer, but I've got a very busy morning ahead of me, so I have to go.' He reached out and touched Zim again. 'Just try to keep alive. Maybe I'll even see you when the war's over.' He made to leave the tent, but Zim stopped him.

'Don't!' Zim shouted. 'Don't go! I... I can help you! Yes! I know what's going to happen in this war. If you keep me here, I can help you to not die.'

Kreiner looked at Zim. 'I would like to accept your help, but if I don't give you up, I'll die anyway.' Then he thought for a few moments. 'Who wins the war? And when?'

Zim shook his head. 'I'll only help you if you don't make me go away. Don't let them take me apart.' Zim tried to keep the fearful quiver out of his voice, but couldn't.

Kriener sighed, and leaned back in his chair. 'I can't. If I didn't let you go, they'd kill me, and take you anyway. Even if you did get away, they'd be searching for you, and you'd be taken once the war's over. If the Reich wants you, they'll find and take you eventually, of not while the war's still going, then once it's finished.'

'They lose the war.' Zim blurted out. 'The Germans lose the war, and the allies win. All your leaders are tried and killed, or kill themselves.'

'What? What do you mean? How can you know that?' Kreiner was, to say the least, a bit sceptical. 'Can you see the future, or something?'

'No, no, no. I travelled back in time, using a time machine! You'll probably die, anyway. Millions of soldiers and civilians died.'

Kreiner gave a low whistle. 'That's a lot of people. The war must go on for a long time.'

Zim shrugged. 'Just until 1945.' It was a moderately lengthed war, in Zims experience.

Kreiner seemed to be struggling for a bit. 'I'll see what I can do to help you.' He stroked Zims head again, ignoring Zim flinching away from the touch. 'Maybe I'll see you after the war.' He left the tent, leaving Zim to continue struggling with the cuffs around his wrists, as he had been doing for the entire time while the soldier was gone. He almost had his right wrist out...


	12. Chapter 12

Zim sighed. He was sitting, blindfolded and chained in the back of a suspensionless army truck. He had made a good try at escaping, having widened the cuffs on his ankles enough so that he could escape; at least, he thought he had. His left ankle cuff was still too small, and instead of escaping, he had fallen straight into the arms of the army general who had arrived early and just entered the tent.

Zim honestly didn't know where he was going. He had been travelling for, by his reckoning, about two hours, but that didn't tell him much. He had no idea what speed they had been travelling at, or in what direction, but he had come up with the idea that he was heading towards Germany. This was not a reassuring thought.

After twenty more minutes, he thought to use his spider legs again, but was reminded of the guards sitting beside him when one of the sneezed. He didn't want to get shot again; he still had a scar from where he had been shot in the leg during the first war. A scar! Irkens did not scar easily, but those hideous projectile weapons had done it. Humans were so stupid.

A few hours later the car came to a stop, and Zim was lead out of the truck, first onto cobbles, then an echoing wooden floor, before being taken down some stairs, left in a small, cold, concreted room with only a metal bench for decoration.

Zim wriggled on his seat, trying to shift the blindfold off his face. He didn't have a nose to hold it on his face, so... After a few seconds it fell down, revealing more about the room that he was in. It was painted in a dull, prison grey, and the (grey) metal door had a small window with bars set in it, which showed a grey, dimly lit roof, of what Zim assumed must be a corridor. He couldn't see much out of it, because of his position, but didn't think there would be much to see.

He sighed and stared at the floor. Grey. Just like the roof, itself a grey illuminated by a small, bare bulb stuck to the ceiling with no cord to hang down on.

After Zim had convinced himself of his isolation, his spiderlegs activated to stretch his bonds. He thought about attacking the door, but realised that his homemade spiderlegs wouldn't cut it, and that his lasers had broken years ago, without a chance of repairs.

After he had discovered the colouring of his cell (grey), and only one obvious exit (the door), Zim took a tour of his small cell, though there weren't any handy vents or secret tunnels he could use to escape. He sat back down on the bench, trying not to let the hopelessness of his situation get him down, but couldn't help it. He was stuck in a place that reminded him of his own empire, but on the wrong side. He wasn't one of the invading forces anymore; now he was one of the species who had been conquered. He shivered, and curled himself up into a little ball, not caring about how pathetic it was of an elite Irken soldier to be cowering like a smeet. He could cower if he wanted to! He was about to get torn apart like the Dib-filth wanted, decades before said filth was even born. That was not fair.

He stayed, curled up in a small ball, until he heard footsteps echoing down the corridor. For a few seconds he remained idle, before realising they might be coming to see him! And if they were coming to see him, he could surprise them at the door and escape! Zim scurried over to the door, and stood beside it, flattening himself to the wall. He heard the footsteps stop outside his door, and braced himself to escape. The humans wouldn't know what hit them!

He stood by the door for a few seconds before realising he was unarmed. He removed a sharp piece of scrap metal from his PAK, and held it out in front of him, ready to stab at the first human that entered the door. Then the humans started talking.

'It should be visible through the door, sir.' One human said to a more important one.

'Really?' Zim saw a faint shadow on the floor, from one of the humans looking through the barred view-hole. 'I don't see anything there. I hope this isn't some sort of practical joke, Phelps. You know what happened to the last man who did that.'

Zim heard the underlings fear in its voice. 'I don't know exactly, sir. There were only vague rumours. He had to be buried with a closed casket.'

'Do you _want_ to know?'

'No, sir!' The underling replied, looking through the abandoned view-hole. 'It appears that its bonds have been released. The door being locked suggests that the creature is still inside.'

'Open the door.' The superior human said, leading to some nervous protests from the inferior one, which were cut off by the superior one repeating his order. Zim tensed up, this was his chance to escape. The door slowly opened an inch, just enough for the muzzle of a gun to point through the door and at Zim.

'Put the weapon down.' The command came from behind the door. Zim skipped to the side, away from the gun and the gap in the door. If they wanted him, they would have to open the door fully to get him.

But the human wasn't going to play Zims game. When he realised Zims plan, he closed the door, and ordered for more soldiers to come. Zim wouldn't be able to fight his way through all of them. 'Or,' he added after his orders, directed towards Zim 'you could put down your weapon, and we could do this the easy way.'

Zim tightened his grip on the piece of metal, feeling some rough edges cut into his skin. 'It is the duty of an elite soldier who has been captured to try to kill as many of the opposition as possible, before either escaping or dying.'

The human outside the door laughed. 'You talk like a prisoner of war. You are not a prisoner of war; you are just an animal. And, as an animal, we can do whatever we want to you. If you obey us, and help us create better technology and weapons, we will be nice to you. You will be given plenty of food, a nicer room somewhere, maybe even a woman to keep you company. When the war ends you may even become a citizen of the Third Reich, with a nice house and pension to live on. If you make life hard for us, we will do the same for you. You will be fed only enough to keep you alive, and you will be moved to a much smaller, damper cell. You will be tortured, and have hideous and painful experiments carried out on you. You have that choice.'

Zim loosened his grip on the metal scrap somewhat. This was a chance to prevent his "worst nightmares," as the humans called them, from happening. 'If I "help" you, you will allow me to go free?'

'Not until the war's over. We hear you are a great scientist, and would hate to lose an advantage like that to the British. You will not leave the building, no, but you will be allowed to move through it freely.'

'And you won't hurt me?' Zim didn't want to get torn apart, not in this primitive time, or at all, come to mention it.

The human shrugged. 'The scientists may want to take samples, but nothing too invasive. And it will have to be approved first. We cannot have a great scientist out of action for most of the war. That would not be any good.'

Zim was getting more and more swayed towards assisting these humans. It would certainly be easier to escape if he was allowed to roam freely throughout the prison. And if they wanted him to work for them, they would have to provide him with materials he couldn't normally get a hold of. He could even use some of the materials to make a STORD. And he wouldn't have to help them for long; the war would be over in 1945. He didn't even have to work that hard, or make good, working machines. He just had to do enough to keep alive, and hopefully not change the outcome of the war. Of course, he would be helping the enemy, and that was inexcusable.

The human could tell the Zim was perched on the edge of agreeing to help them. 'Of course, if you don't want to help us, I'm sure the scientists would want to know exactly what those things on your head are made of. They may not be able to do that without removing them, but...' he trailed off, leaving Zim's mind open to wander the possibilities.

Of course, all humans were Zims enemy, and this group was offering him good incentives to work for them... Zim made a decision, and the scrap of metal fell to the ground.

-----

Zim had been led to a quite swanky room by one of the guards who had come to help pacify him if it had been necessary. Zim was now lying on the room's incredibly soft bed, under the warm and comforting duvet, and listening to the radio, which was positioned on the bedside table. He had been disappointed to find that he couldn't listen to any of the non-German stations, so was listening to a repeat of a speech given by Hitler the previous day. It had the same amount of patriotic nothing that Zim expected from a pitiful human (though his brain made no mention of the similar speeches Zim had heard the Tallests give, while he was listening on in rapt attention).

He sighed and turned the radio off, looking longingly at the door. His only chance for escape. The window, which had bars on it anyway, was far too high off the ground for him to be able to climb out of the building through, and the door was locked. He had checked the lock many times, even shouting about how he had been told he could walk freely through the building. His spiderlegs hadn't even been useful in opening the door, having bent on attacking it. Stupid, cheap, earth-metal replacements, he should have made them using something stronger. Maybe he could do that here.

He could always check the en-suite bathroom again, though that would be pointless. There were far too many watery taps in there for him to be comfortable. The desk had had slightly more possibilities for interest, though all it had contained was a desk lamp and some stationary, not even any paper to write on. He had given up on it after carving his name into the desk, in both English and Irken. That'd show them. The wardrobe was no better, with a spare uniform, in black, that was far too big for him anyway. He ignored it, and hung his coat up on a coat hanger that he pulled out and hung on the door knob.

He rolled on to his stomach and buried his head in the pillow. Maybe he could just stay in the warm bed, until somebody came to tell him what to do. He pulled the duvet up over his head. That was the way to do it. Stay warm in bed until somebody gives you instructions. He closed his eyes and fell into a light doze, the heaviest sleeping he could do if he wasn't severely injured.

-----

The next morning Zim was woken by a sharp knocking at the door, followed by the sound of it unlocking. 'You will be given 10 minutes to get ready, then you have a meeting with our Obersturmbannfuhrer.'

'The what?' Zim asked, completely thrown by the new word. His PAK wasn't translating it.

'The Obersturmbannfuhrer.' The voice outside the door repeated. 'He runs this place.'

Zim swung himself out of bed, and straightened out his shirt and pants slightly, before pulling on his boots and coat. He then opened the door and took a look at the human who had come to collect him. It looked very pale and worn, as if he did lots of strenuous work inside, and didn't get any time to go outside or rest. Zim once again felt pride for being Irken. Not only was the much longer life span useful, there wasn't any need for sleep, which he knew would mess up a humans system if the human was deprived of it for too long. He was also wearing a crumpled uniform, and had a general state of disarray about him.

'Uhhh,' the human was slightly taken aback by Zims appearance, though he had been warned of it before-hand. 'F- follow me.' He stuttered out. Walking a few steps, before checking to see that Zim was following him, which he was.

They walked for about half a minute in silence, before the human tried to start a conversation, asking, 'do you know what you'll be working on?'

'No.' Zim personally hoped it was weapon development. He enjoyed weapons.

'I work in tank and weapon devopment and upgrade. Whatever's needed at the time' the human continued, after Zims unhelpful answer. 'I'm glad I'm not qualified for eugenics.' He shuddered. 'I've been there once, and the smells, the sounds...' His voice cracked a bit, and he realised it, so quickly added, 'not that I feel any pity for the jews. I'm not a sympathiser at all.'

Zim shrugged. One group of humans was the same as another. 'Why do you hate these jew-humans so much?' He had been wondering about it for a while. It was probably just because of another one of the petty distinctions humans made between each other. Their division would just make them so much easier to conquer in the end, so Zim didn't wonder too much.

Instead of a real answer, Zim got the normal spiel of propaganda he could have gotten off the radio. In fact, most of the humans response seemed to be quoted off the radio directly. The human was still talking as he opened the door to the Obersturmbannfuhrer 's office.

'You can stay outside the door, Fritz.' The human sitting behind the desk said to Zims guide, who had finished his commentary on "why the Jews are a menace to the pure German race." 'Ah, Fritz', the human said, when the aforementioned Fritz had left the room. 'Two of his grandparents were taken to the camps, but luckily for us he is not as jewish as they are. It would almost be a shame to waste a mind as good as his, even if it is part jewish.'

'But not enough for him to be taken to the camps.' Zim added, trying to get his head around the confusing system that was in place.

'Yes, indeed.' The human agreed. He shuffled some papers on his desk, merely for effect. He knew what was on each of them, having studied them furiously over the past few days. He put the papers down and looked at Zim. 'You apparently have some advanced technology at your disposal, that, if I am to believe the reports correctly, you made yourself.' He shuffled through the papers again, and brought out a sheet from the pile. 'You made your own refrigerator?' Zim nodded. 'And stretched the limit of a store brought radio, so it can reach well into Russian soil from your house?' Again, Zim nodded. 'And a machine that appears to remove the impurities from water.' Zim nodded once more. It had been one of the first things he had made, and was almost constantly falling apart.

'You also have a cellar door that cannot be opened, even by our strongest soldiers. Your... house-sharer doesn't seem to know what's in there either, or how to open it. I suppose only you would be able to open it?'

Zim nodded once more. 'The atmosphere down there isn't breathable by humans.' There were still some noxious chemical fumes down there that limited the time even Zim could spend down there.

'And I guess you wouldn't open it for us even if it was.' Zim didn't want to reply, in case the human thought that was a traitorous reaction, and had him sent to be taken apart.

'And there are reports of an old car that can travel very fast, and doesn't need to refill on petrol. I suppose you made that as well.' Zim nodded.

The human shuffled the papers once more, and coughed slightly. 'Do you have any experience with weapons? The modified gun that was taken from you would suggest that you do, but-'

The human was cut off by Zims excitement. 'Of course I can do weapons! Zim would gladly work on weapons! What do you want Zim to do with them?' He was bouncing up and down in his chair.

'Well, you'll be working under one of our more experienced scientists before you can do anything by yourself. That's why I had Fritz bring you up; you'll be working under him.' He shuffled the papers once more, 'and in case you were wondering, your house-sharer, Kurt Reubel, is fine and looking after your house.'

'Oh, uh, fine, fine.' Zim had completely forgotten that Kurt might be in trouble. But now he knew his house and the experiments inside were being looked after, so it didn't matter.

'Fritz! Come in.' the human shouted to the door. Fritz entered, and gave a hazy salute. Zim could tell the human had no military training. 'You have a new apprentice. Introduce him to what you're working on. I expect updates every week on how he's progressing.'

'Yes, sir.' Fritz said, and gave another weak salute. 'Follow me again, uh...' He didn't know his new apprentice's name.

'Zim.' They both left the room.

Fritz lead Zim almost to the other side of the building, and down a few staircases, before opening a door. Zim gasped at the sight of what was behind the door. He had never been more excited to see a piece of human equipment before. 'Do you like it?' Fritz asked, entering the room after Zim, and closing the door.

Zim nodded. It was a huge tank. He walked over it, and was at eye-level with the top of the wheel tracks. 'There is one problem.' Zim said, staring at the tank, and noticing a glaring problem with it. 'There's no gun. It needs a gun.'

'That's what we're working on. Me and my team, when the rest of them get here, anyway. It's an old Panzer II tank, and we've been asked if we could improve on it. It did have a gun, but we removed it so we can view the insides of the machine better, and make our own adjustments and fixes to the machine.' He walked over to a bench, and pulled out some designs. 'This is what we've got planned so far.' He said, pulling Zims attention away from the tank, and towards him.

Zim walked over reluctantly, and stood on a stool to get a better view of the designs. He studied them carefully, a grin forming on his face as he realised what this meant. 'Zim can leave!' He shouted, pointing dramatically at Fritz 'Using your own machines against you!' And with that he ran over to the Panzer, crawled up it, and entered through the hatch in the roof, slamming it after himself. Once he got inside, he started flicking the switches and levers that he had identified on the plans to be the ones that started and moved the machine. He tried the switches in different combinations and numerous times, and grew more and more confused. Why wasn't it working?

He was halted in his frantic pounding of switches and levers by a knock on the hatch of the tank. Zim opened it slowly, and saw Fritz looking down into the tank. 'Its engine was broken, which is why we have it. If you want to escape, you're going to have to try a different way.' He offered his hand to Zim, and hauled him out when Zim grabbed it. 'I won't tell anybody about this because you're new, and I don't want to get in trouble with the Obersturmbannfuhrer.' He didn't want to lose the new assistant he had been trusted with. What would he say, or do, if he did?

'Fine.' Zim said sulkily. 'I will fix your machine, and make it better. So much better will it be!' He went back over to the bench, and picked up the plans and a pencil, ready to adjust their machine as much as possible. He was disturbed from his fixing by Fritz speaking.

'Ah! Here's the rest of the team has finally arrived.' He said, walking over to the door, ready to tell them off for their tardiness.

The "rest of the team" consisted of three other weapons experts. They entered the room at the same time, chatting and laughing, but stopped short when Zim was noticed.

'What's that?' A short, heavy set man asked, pointing at Zim.

'He's our new team member. Assigned by the Obersturmbannfuhrer himself.' Fritz said, to try and stop any protests before they began.

'It's an animal.' The second one said. 'I'm not working with an animal. It's bad enough having to work with a part Jew, but an actual animal.' He shuddered, and huddled up into himself. 'I'm not working with it.'

Zim had walked over to the confrontation, and decided to have his input on it. 'I don't want to be working with you filthy humans, either, and am only doing so because _they_ are making me. But Zim will escape. You will not keep Zim here forever.' He muttered the last part. He didn't want the humans to learn of his plans to escape.

'It can talk!' The second one said in a patronising voice. 'Can you say "I'm a hideous monster?" can you?'

'Stop that.' Fritz interrupted Zim before he could start screaming at the human. 'We all have to work together, and it will be much easier to do so if you can at least ignore each other. If you have any complaints, I'm sure that the Obersturmbannfuhrer would be glad to hear that you don't agree with his decisions. Maybe he'll even look into the communist party membership you had when you were younger.'

The second one (whose name turned out to be Johann) glared at Fritz. He had always been a proud Nazi, but if he made a complaint against the Obersturmbannfuhrer or his decisions, a membership in the communist party might appear on his records. 'I'm not going to talk to it.' He hissed, still annoyed that he had to work with what he saw as an animal.


	13. Chapter 13

The rest of the day went reasonably well for Zim. He found himself ignored by Johann, even to the extent that Johann ignored anything that Zim said, and sometimes talked over the top of Zim as if he wasn't there, which annoyed Zim no end. Zim did manage to get his revenge though, by taking all the pencils and putting them in his pocket. Because Johann was ignoring Zim, he couldn't ask him for a pencil. They were both eventually told off by Fritz, and went back to passively aggressively ignoring each other with no tampering of stationery.

Zim found it easier to work with Lars, the dark haired one who had first complained about Zim. After a brief conversation about various chemicals and machines used to cause the most amount if damage with the least amount of equipment, he had accepted Zim as a colleague. However, this acceptance was somewhat tempered by his staring and/ or flinching whenever Zim got too close.

The third human Zim didn't know the name of. Zim found him to be quite strange, too silent and looming for a start. The human didn't seem to be there, it just seemed to lurk in the background, not saying anything and startling Zim anytime he turned around and the human was there. Zim didn't believe any human should be that quiet or that tall.

The first was spent as a "brainstorming" session, as the humans put it. Zim didn't see the need to do so much planning; if you had a plan and knew what you were going to do, you did it and worked out any bugs along the way. You didn't work on the plan for weeks and weeks and weeks, arguing over every small, insignificant thing. It was nearly lunchtime on the third day when Zim dropped his head into his arms and groaned at the lack of progress they were making. 'Why is this taking so long?' He whined.

'Huh?' Fritz asked, 'why is what taking so long?'

'This.' Zim waved a hand at the plans. 'You're spending too long working on it. You do not need three days to work on a problem of armour! You just make the metal thicker, and move on.'

'Really?' Johann spoke to Zim for the first time. 'And how would the engine in this tank move that extra weight. Why don't you tell us, if you're so brilliant?'

Zim didn't miss the sarcasm, but he still shrugged. 'That is an engine problem, and you work on it when you're fixing the engines. This can't be the most advanced engine you have.' The scorn was evident in his voice.

'Zim.' Fritz said calmly. 'We're trying to make the tank's armour more efficient without compromising the speed of the tank. If we made it heavier, it would be slower. It's just easier for everyone to spend more time on the project to try and find a suitable answer.'

'Bah.' Zim disagreed with the human. 'You can't do that with the material you have. The only thing you can do is add more metal to the machine, and make its engine stronger.'

'And I've told you, we can't do that.' Fritz was getting a bit fed up with Zim and his attitude. He had been unco-operative for the whole three days, either refusing to help, or making the same suggestions over and over again, all of which had to be rejected.

'Well you should.' Zim said, folding his arms to signal that he had made his final suggestion, and he wouldn't do anything until they either accepted it or moved on to something else.

Fritz rubbed his forehead. He could feel a headache coming on. 'Why don't we have a 15 minute break for lunch, and all calm down?' He was starting to feel a bit hungry himself. 'Zim, I want you to come to my office with me.' He said, turning around to leave the room.

Zim hurried after the human to his office, following him inside the tiny, cramped space. The desk seemed to be larger than the room it was in. 'Yes, sir?' Zim asked, looking at the mess spread about the floor and desk.

Fritz opened a paper bag and took a sandwich out of it. 'You're not being very helpful, Zim.' He said, taking a bite from his sandwich.

'Eh,' Zim shrugged. He didn't have to help the humans. He nudged a pile of papers with his toe, and caught sight of an old squashed sandwich. The humans were so disgusting.

Fritz sighed. 'I have to give a report on your work by the end of the week, and if you're not helpful, I can't give a positive report to my superiors.' He looked at the blank look on Zim's face, and sighed again. 'If they decide you're not conductive to the completion of the project, they may decide that you would be better off somewhere else.' He realised Zim still wasn't getting it. 'Somewhere like disease research, or the experimentation centre.'

'Ooooh.' Zim enjoyed disease research. He had been trying to obtain a sample of the Black Death when his STORD broke. 'Zim does not mind researching diseases.'

Fritz held the bridge of his nose. 'No, Zim. You wouldn't be _researching_, you would be the experiment. They would perform tests on you.'

'Ah.' Zim got it now. 'Yes. Zim does not want to be tested on, so I will help you with your pitiful machines.' There was a pause for a few seconds. 'The armour needs to be thicker and the engine needs to be stronger.'

Fritz dropped his head into his hands, the sandwich completely forgotten and in danger of getting crushed by a dangerously leaning stack of papers. 'I've told you plenty of times, we can't do that.

'Hmmmm.' Zim squinted at the human. 'Give Zim 15 minutes to think about it, and then your problem will be solved.' He exited the room, leaving Fritz to search for his sandwich while trying not to disrupt the pile of papers that had just toppled over.

------

Amazingly, 15 minutes later Zim had come up with a solution to the problem. Apparently the threat of torture and experimentation was a good incentive. 'You must remove the weight from the side sections of the tank, and put it on the front.'

Lars scratched his head and look at the plans. 'Huh. Why didn't we think of that?'

'Because it makes no sense.' Johann replied. 'It makes the sides weaker and open to enemy attack.'

Zim snorted. 'If the enemy gets around to your sides, then you deserve to be shot.' The silent man nodded at this comment.

Fritz sighed. 'We'll put it down on the "suggestions" paper, and if we can't come up with anything else by the end of the week, we'll get started on that plan.'

For the rest of the week, other ideas were put forwards. Thoughts on how to strengthen the metal were put forwards, though none of them were usable. A few slight adjustments to the design of the tank were made, but ignored in favour of completing the task at hand.

But by Friday the best idea they still had was to make the side metal thinner, and put the excess on the front. It was not a decision agreed on by all, but their deadline was coming up and Fritz had to make sure they got the re-design to their superiors in time.

As everyone else had left on that final day, Zim, who normally stuck around anyway to try and examine the tank, stayed behind. 'Sir?' He asked knocking slightly on the door of Fritz's office, before opening it and walking in anyway.

'Oh, ah, Zim.' Fritz looked up from some papers on his desk. 'I told you I can't give you any equipment to fix the tank.'

'No, no.' Zim shook his head. 'I have no need for your equipment today.' Zim looked about himself sneakily, then walked closer to fritz. 'Have you written your report yet?

'Ah, not yet.' Fritz said slowly, sliding the sheet of paper he had been working on underneath some other ones on his desk. 'I was just about to start when you came in.' He slid some more papers under the one he had just hidden from view.

'Good.' Zim stood up straighter in front of the table. 'This is what you will write: "Zim is a great worker and amazing genius."' He looked at the human to make sure he was writing it all down. He wasn't.

'Write it down.' He said, waving a hand at the human.

Fritz shook his head. 'You can't write your own evaluations. That's not how it works. Anyway, I'm going to be giving you a good score, so you don't have to worry about getting transferred.'

'Good.' Zim moved closer to the desk. If he could see what the human was going to write...

'Get out, Zim,' Fritz said, pointing to the door.

'Ah,' Zim tried to stall his exit. 'I had some designs in my room, and on the bench out there. They are not there now.'

'I haven't seen them. Now, go.' Fritz pointed at the door again. Zim left, while grumbling under his breath.

When Fritz was sure Zim had gone, he pulled out the papers he had previously hidden. One of them was the report that he had just started on. The other ones were the designs that Zim had lost. Fritz found them to be quite interesting. One was for a tank, which was unfinished, but had a completely different design to the ones Fritz knew of.

Fritz thought the second set of designs was much more interesting. It was what appeared to be a gun, however, instead of firing bullets or other projectiles it did something Fritz couldn't quite figure out. He wondered vaguely if it would be able to work, or was just the crazed scribbling of an unstable mind. Whatever it was, he couldn't make any sense of the writing. He would have to return them to Zims room, to see what else he did with them.

-----

The next few months went very slowly for Zim. He spent his days working with the humans, and his nights working on blueprints and designs, just to try and stop the mind-numbing boredom that comes from being locked up with nothing else to do. Nothing else to do after he had fixed the radio so it could pick up non-German stations, anyway.

That night Zim groaned and dropped his pencil onto the blank sheet of paper. He was finding it impossible to concentrate on anything. He wanted to go outside! He went over to the barred window and starred out of it. He could see some rooftops in the distance, and an extensive garden in front of him.

He pulled on the bars until his arms hurt, but couldn't even get them to move. He gave up on the bars and went over to the door. He didn't think it had been locked with a key that night, so only the bolt would be in place to keep it locked.

Zim grinned. A bolt could easily be dislodged or broken, even with human metal. He brought out a spider leg and jammed it into the gap between the doors, levering the door away from the bolt. He was forced to jump to the side when the door suddenly sprung open, and almost smashed him in the face.

Then, for the first time since he had arrived, he took a step out of his room without a human guarding him. It was a wonderful feeling.

Zim set off down the corridor, looking in odd rooms every so often, and taking turnings down random passages. Within five minutes he was hopelessly lost, and looking out of window that appeared to be a few levels higher than the one in his room, though he couldn't remember going up any stairs.

'Hmmmm.' Zim pondered, looking out the window to the ground that was much further away than it had been before. He needed to find a way to go down, then he could take one of the cars, and head off to Switzerland. His house and experiments would be safe until the war was over, so he didn't have to worry about going back and getting caught by the Germans again.

Another five minutes later Zim had made it to the other side of the building, and also down a few stories. He was also starting to recognise a few areas that he passed every day. There was the tapestry of the swastika, there was the portrait of Hitlers face, and there was the inexplicable roast chicken. It always reminded Zim of GIR when he saw it. He picked up some of the ammo that was lying around, cursing the humans for their laziness and disregard for their own weapons.

After turning a corner, he recognised the staircase that was usually taken to get to the ground floor. He joyfully skipped down it, careful not to trip over the heavy stone steps.

When he reached the bottom of the steps he flattened himself against the wall, and peered cautiously round the corner. Zim knew the outside was guarded at night, but wasn't sure if the inside was. Once he was sure that there were no humans in the immediate area, he ran out and headed for the door.

But then Zim stopped. He could leave now, and try to steal a car, or he could find the actual working tank that Fritz had mentioned once. It was just a prototype he had said, and had said that it was badly built and probably wouldn't work, but Zim didn't care. He could make it so it was better! He had enough time.

And so Zim hurried away from the door, going down an unknown passage and getting completely lost again. 'Stupid humans!' He shouted in annoyance. Why couldn't they just make structures that made sense, instead of so many doors, and turnings. He leaned against a wall and rubbed his eyes. And there weren't any lights on, which just made things more difficult.

He saw a door further down the hallway, and decided to try going down that way.

-----

Three hours later the Obersturmbannfuhrer came in for work. He hurried up to his office, and started bustling around in a hurry. Today was a very important day for him, and for everybody else in the castle. Today the fuehrer was coming for an inspection. They had been preparing for weeks, but it was the last minute preparations that really mattered. He still had six hours before the arrival, but neatness had to be assured. Cleanliness, tidiness, and order. They were the matter of the day.

He set off to do a tour of the building. He could get an underling to do it, but he wanted to make sure everything was up to his standards. He would be the one that would be held accountable for any mess, so he would be the one to check the building.

But first he had something more important to do than obsessively recheck every room in the building. He picked up a small package that he had brought in with him, and headed out of the room.

A few minutes later he arrived at a door. He rapped sharply at it once, and knocked the door open with his knuckles. This was not good. The door was supposed to be locked a night, when only late night workers and night guards were in.

He pushed it open slowly, hoping that their guest had returned to his room. He dumped the package on the bed, and quickly made an inspection of the few hiding places in the room. he cursed when he realised Zim was most definitely not in the room, and may have even been gone for the entire night. He hoped that Zim was still in the building, and hadn't managed to escape yet. If Zim was still in the castle there was still a hope for finding him again. the Obersturmbannfuhrer didn't want to be the one who had to tell the fuehrer that the entire reason he had come to the town had run off in the night because the door hadn't been locked properly.

He hurried out of the room, eager to alert the guards, and call in everyone that had gone to their homes for the night. Zim needed to be caught, no matter how big a mess was made while finding him.

-----

Zim, however, was completely unaware of the fuss that was being made of his disappearance, and was just setting the last wires in place on the tank he had found. He was giggling slightly. His exit would be grand.

------

There were two groups of soldiers in the hunt for the missing Irken. One group was searching through the streets of the town below, and the countryside surrounding the building. They were seperated into pairs for the hunt. The other group was searching the castle, going from the ground floor up in a systematic way.

A soldier searching the ground floor was the first one to discover the missing alien. Or, more precisely, he was the first to hear the noise of the tank starting up. Because curiosity is one of the things the Nazi's could not train out of their soldiers, he was also the first to get crushed as Zim crashed into the wall in his attempt to escape the room.

Zim laughed inside the tank as he felt the walls collapse around him. Now he would be outside, and able to take the tank out of the country, riding to Switzerland! He nudged the tank forwards a bit more, and felt another wall crumble. 'Eh?' That wasn't right.

Zim peeked out through the viewing holes, and saw sumptuously decorated walls around him. He must have gone in the wrong direction. He grinned, laughing a bit more. That was easily fixed.

The tank did a long, slow U-turn, knocking down more walls along the way. More soldiers were finally arriving, being careful to stand out of the tanks path while shooting harmless bullets at it.

Zim laughed at the soldiers futile efforts, pushing the tank forwards more, until it breached the outer walls. 'Whahahahahaha!' He could feel the tank dip slightly as it went over the edge of the building, touching down in the paved courtyard. Freedom was just in front of him!

Then it stopped.

Zim blinked and started tugging at the levers, pulling them backwards and forwards, tugging at switches and pushing buttons, but nothing worked. 'Aaaaaaaaaaaaah!!!!!'

He started beating at the controls, then pulling out sections of wall, removing wires and processes. Why wasn't the tank working!?

When Zim realised he slumped down into a huddle on the seat. These stupid human vehicles needed petrol! Why hadn't he remembered that? He had forgotten to put more petrol into it! 'I can still escape!' Zim shouted, opening the hatch of the tank and crawling out

The soldiers had been watching the tank with caution when it stopped. Raised rifles were pointed at it, and all of them had nerves hanging on a hair-wire, ready to jump out of the way if the tank started moving again, or if the crumbling masonry gave way.

The Obersturmbannfuhrer was livid. This was the most important day for them, and whoever it was had fixed the tank, and taken it for a test drive! He ground his teeth together. It had to be Zim. Useful for the project or not, he was going to put that little animal into the labs as soon as the day was finished. Who cares what Fritz says about Zim being useful, or having some good "ideas" or "designs."

When Zim eventually lifted the hatch on the tank, the guards were about ready to shoot anything that moved, and the Obersturmbannfuhrer was quite ready to allow them.

'Zim!' he shouted, when Zim was exiting the tank.

Zim paused and turned around. It didn't look like he'd get far if he jumped and ran for it. He pulled off a hasty salute. 'Sir!' He looked around himself, thinking quickly. 'You found my test tank.'

'Your test tank?' The Obersturmbannfuhrer was not convinced.

'Yes!' Zim nodded energetically. 'Yes, Zim was testing out the, ah, engine on this tank. I had been told it was broken,' Zim started to really get into his lie. 'And thought it would be great to be able to fix it for the Fuhrer's arrival. Wouldn't he be so proud. Though you have now ruined it!' He pointed accusingly at the leader. 'Yes! You ruined it! Zim was going to build a laser, too. But now I can't.'

'A laser?' Zims lie was, apparently, not very convincing. 'And what is a lay-zer?'

'Eh...' Zim scratched his head. He knew that it would be impossible to build laser using the current earth technology.

'Never mind that right now. Just get out of there.' The Obersturmbannfuhrer walked over to the tank, grabbing Zim under the arms as he crawled out of the tank hatch. He tucked Zim under his arm and marched away. 'Clean this place up!' he barked to the soldiers standing behind, wincing as he stepped into the bloody pulp of an unfortunate soldier. 'I want it to be spotless for the Fuhrer!' He hurried away, still carrying Zim with him.

Zim started struggling with him once they had left the room. 'Put me down! Put Zim down!' He managed to break out of the humans grip and fall to the floor.

Zim picked himself off the floor and dusted himself off. 'Now I will just go in that direction...' He headed towards the doors leading to the outside courtyard, but was caught up as a soldier grabbed him around the collar and dragged him backwards.

'You will go straight to your room if I have to drag you there myself. Then you will dress in a clean uniform, and you will only come out when it's time to meet the fuehrer.' He pulled Zim up closer to his face. 'If anything goes wrong today, anything at all, you will never see the outside again, and any pain you have felt in the past will be nothing compared to what the scientists will put you through. Do you understand me?'

Zim tried to gasp out a reply around the suffocating hold the soldier had on his shirt. Finally he managed to twist out of the choking grip, and gasp out a reply that indicated that, not only did he understand, but he also wished for it to be known that they would have his full co-operation in whatever he was told to do, so long as he was never given over to the scientists.

The Obersturmbannfuhrer accepted Zim's agreement, and hustled him upstairs, guarding him all the way to his room, where Zim was promptly locked up so the Obersturmbannfuhrer could get on with the task of over-seeing the clean up process.

Zim had a small tantrum against the door for a few minutes, kicking and hitting it until he got bored of it. He went over to his bed and slumped down onto it, hearing a crunch as he lay on top of some brown paper packages tied up with string.

He picked it up and shook it, listening for any noise that might give away its contents. It was completely silent, so Zim tore the packaging open, never having been one for waiting.

From the wreckage of the paper he pulled a small pile of clothes. Zim took it to be some sort of uniform, though they seemed to have put two different sorts into the packages. One of them had to be a dress uniform, though he couldn't tell which one.

He picked out the pieces of clothes that he decided were the least hideous, and removed his old, torn, stained coat, replacing it with a shirt and new, grey jacket. He took off his old pants that had been held up by string, and replaced them with new ones that buttoned at the top and fit snugly. He grinned, examining himself in the mirror. It was good to have clothes that fit for once, though he would have also liked gloves and boots.

He trod barefoot back to the bed, picking up the rest of the clothing, and all of what Zim thought of as the "useless strips of material" and hung it all in the cupboard. He thought he remembered humans referring to it as a "tie", or something, but ignored it as useless all the same.

He went back to the bed and swept all the paper off it and on to the floor, then lay down on the now cleared space. He looked down at his feet and wriggled his toes. Maybe even just stockings if they couldn't get him boots. His old ones had large holes in them, and they got cold during winter. Some stockings might be good to keep the cold out.

He kicked his feet a bit more, then rolled to the side of the bed and switched on the radio. There was general news about how the war was going, there was an ad asking for support and donations to be made to the army effort, and another promoting rations. Zim didn't understand why the Nazis needed to advertise so much. They had the unwavering support of millions; if anybody did complain, they could just be sent to a prison camp, and made to work for the country they betrayed. He flicked the channel, and a German folk song was playing. He lay back and let the sound of accordions wash over him.

A few hours and a dozen stations later the door to Zims room was opened. He looked up and saw a human, obviously come to escort him to the fuehrer. Zim stood up straight to attention, grabbing his old boots and slipping them on his feet.

'Follow me.' The human ordered, leaving the room with Zim following. He led Zim down floors and up floors, twisting and turning around corridors and through rooms, until Zim was completely lost. 'In there.' the human ordered, opening the door and pushing Zim into a rather plush lounge area. Apparently this would be where he would meet the fuehrer.

Zim brushed himself down self-consciously, trying to get his already neat clothes neater and cleaner. He failed in the effort, and picked up a biscuit that was sitting on the table. It was so long since he had any decent snack food that one biscuit wasn't enough, and he ate two more within five minutes. He was eyeing off the rest of the plate when the door opened.

While Zim was quickly brushing a few stray crumbs off his shirt, the Obersturmbannfuhrer entered the room. He gave the room a quick once over, just to make sure Zim hadn't trashed it completely in the five minutes he had been left alone in it. All that had happened was three biscuits missing from the plate.

'At least you haven't destroyed this room.' He fixed Zim with a glare that could melt recruits into quivering heaps of tears and regrets.

Zim looked back at the human, completely innocent of any wrong-doing. It wasn't his fault the tank had brought down a few walls. They just hadn't made the walls strong enough.

The Obersturmbannfuhrer sighed. 'Just stand there and don't eat any more biscuits. I'll be back in half an hour.' He left the room, ordering a soldier to stay by the door to make sure Zim didn't do anything.

Zim looked at the guard, then at the clock on the wall. It was 12:30 already; when would the fuehrer get here?

The clock slowly ticked forwards, first five minutes, then ten. Zim sighed and started mentally flicking through his memory database when it reached 15 past, trying to dig up every piece of information he had gathered on World War two and Hitler.

Apparently he hadn't paid much attention in those classes, because the only thing he could really remember was that he didn't want to get caught in the concentration camps. Or with doctor Mengele. If he had had the choice, Zim would never have come to Germany in the first place. Zim sighed. He knew he should have set up base in Switzerland. But only a few more years before the "allies" come to destroy Germany, so he didn't have to worry too hard, just try to stay on their good side, and how hard could that be? Unfortunately, Zim didn't have an outsiders view on himself, so didn't realise exactly how easy it was for him to get on somebody's bad side.

The guard was starting to get a bit fidgety as 1:00 rolled around and past. He knew he would have to wait until at least quarter past before he could leave, but being locked in the same room as "the creature" creeped him out slightly. He didn't not like the shiny red eyes or sickly green skin at all. It was an unnatural creature, and he wished it would just be handed over to the scientists. And it was looking at him now. Why was it looking at him?

'When will he be here?' Zim asked, in a strangely accented German that made the soldiers skin crawl.

The soldier avoided Zims gaze and ignored the question. He did NOT want to be drawn into talking with it.

'Hey!' Zim did not like being ignored. 'Hey! Answer me!' He took a step towards the soldier.

The soldier took an involuntary step back. 'They'll be here soon.' He replied, hoping that it was the truth.

He was proven right when, only a few seconds later, in walked a man that even Zim recognised, both from history classes, and all the propaganda posters he had seen. Adolf Hitler.


	14. Chapter 14

Zim looked up at the fuehrer, and found himself to be unimpressed. Instead of coming face to face with an evil dictator, Zim found himself looking at a rather normal human with funny facial hair. He looked up at the averagely heighted fuehrer, and said the first thing that came into his head. 'You seem very... short.'

'What?!' Hitler nearly exploded. 'What is the meaning of this?'

'I'm sorry, sir.' The Obersturmbannfuhrer kicked Zim to the side as he hurried to ensure that Hitler wasn't too upset by the comment. 'Despite its intelligence, it doesn't seem to understand the chain of command. Or manners.' He gave Zim a Look, which Zim completely ignored, staring at the wall and seeming to ignore the conversation.

'You should have trained it better.' Hitler seemed to be pouting slightly.

'Of course, sir. I assure you, after this meeting is over, he will be punished for his rudeness.'

This seemed to have mollified the fuehrer somewhat. 'Now then,' Hitler crouched down slightly to look Zim in the eyes. 'What is this?' He had been given notes on it earlier in the week, but had only skimmed through them, and had forgotten most of it already.

'I am an-' Zim was cut off by a suddenly screaming fuehrer. 'I did not ask you! You will not talk to me unless I tell you to!' Zim tried to back away from the slightly acidic spit flying from the mouth of the German leader, but was held in place by the Obersturmbannfuhrer's hands on his shoulders.

'He's an Irken, sir.' This time the reply came from the right person.

'And where is it from?'

'Irk, sir. Apparently it's a planet far away from earth.'

Hitler seemed to find this rather amusing. 'Himmler will be disappointed.' He stood up and walked around Zim, pushing the Obersturmbannfuhrer out of the way as he did. He stopped in front of Zim and squatted down, then reached out a hand and grabbed one of Zim's antenna.

Zim held his hands tight at the intrusion made by the human. This human should be thought of as a tallest, despite his height. And human-ness. And hair, though he seemed to have less of it than some other humans, and a weird patch of it on his face. The smell was also awful, though Zim managed to stop himself from shuddering at the proximity of the human. Of course he still couldn't stop himself from pushing the human away when he squeezed the antenna he was holding.

'Let go!' Zim barked out, slapping the fuehrer's hand out of his personal space. He tried to take a step backwards, only for the grip on his shoulders to return and tighten. He suddenly realised how much danger he was in. This was the human that had almost committed genocide. Zim remembered that he didn't want to be on its bad side.

The Obersturmbannfuhrer held Zim tightly by the shoulders. He should have had him tied up, now look at what he had done! He saw Hitler start to redden in rage. He would be lucky if he got out of here with his job still around. He would be even luckier if he was still got to hold the job.

'Sir.' he said, hoping to cut Hitler off with an offer of biscuits before the rage started off. They were ginger nuts, so he should like them.

'What!?'

'Would you like a biscuit?' He removed a hand from Zim's shoulder and picked up the plate from the table.

'What sort are they!' The question was less asked then it was screamed.

'They're ginger nuts, sir. Made especially for you.'

'Ooooh.' Hitler picked one off the plate and took a dainty nibble from it. The fuehrer, having been calmed somewhat, looked at the Obersturmbannfuhrer. 'You said you had trained it.'

'He is trained, just very temperamental. I think you got in his space.'

'You should train it better. I would not let one of my dogs behave like that.' He took another nibble of the biscuit.

'Hey!' Zim shouted. 'Zim is no animal! Zim does not need training! Hey! Hey! Listen to me!!!' They were ignoring him, and he didn't like it. Nor did he like how they were talking about him needing training, like he was an animal. An animal that could be taken apart at any moment for study. He had to resist the urge to show visible fear.

'Hmmm.' Hitler looked down at Zim. 'You say it's intelligent?'

'Yes, sir. We have it working on some projects for us.'

Hitler bent down again, and slipped on a pair of glasses. 'So you came from space.' He asked Zim, speaking in a loud, slow voice. He picked up Zim's hand, holding it tightly despite Zims attempts to pull away, and started studying it. 'How did you arrive here?'

Zim ignored the human touching his hand, and tried not to flinch too much. He didn't like contact. 'I flew.'

'Do you have your plane here still?' Hitler was suddenly looking Zim in the eyes.

'Eh? What plane?'

'The one you came to the planet in.'

'Oh no.' Zim tried to use the break in concentration to take his hand back from Hitler. 'I lost it.' It was said in an off-handed manner, as all Zims concentration was on his hand.

'Liar!' Hitler violently threw Zims hand away. 'You would not just lose your only way off the planet.'

'It crashed!' Zim was rubbing his hand to try and get the feeling of touching off it. 'Into the mountain.'

'Which mountains?' If Hitler could get the space plane first, he could use it against the Russians.

Zim pointed in a vague direction. 'Those mountains.'

Hitler squinted then stood up. He turned to the guard who had come in with him. 'Find out where the plane crashed. Use any means possible.' He then indicated to the guards to take Zim from the room, and sat down in the armchair, nibbling on another biscuit.

Zim was dragged from the room, screaming at the humans about how the plane had broken into a million itty-bitty pieces. The Obersturmbannfuhrer was standing still in shock. By any means possible would probably kill Zim, or at least make it so he couldn't work on anything for quite a while. He had a hurried conversation with the fuehrer, in which Zims' future usefulness was discussed, along with how he would be useless if he was unable to work. Hitler considered this for a few moments, then agreed to this logic. The further statement that Zim could build him his own space plane, and would start on the plans immediately, also helped to push the fuehrer's decision. 45 seconds after the guards and Zim left the room, the Obersturmbannfuhrer hurried after them, slightly annoyed at having to act as messenger boy.

'He's to be unharmed,' he said to the soldiers. 'By order of the fuehrer,' he added, because they looked about to mutiny and start torturing the noisy midget regardless. The soldiers let go of Zim roughly, and pushed him away.

'Good.' Zim brushed his clothes straight. 'Finally somebody here understands my true worth.' Zim ignored that it was the Fuhrer who had ordered him off to be tortured in the first place. Tallests were unpredictable, and the only thing that really mattered was their last order. 'Now, take me back to your leader.' He strode off down the corridor, feeling a hand on his shoulder spin him in the opposite direction, and sent him that way.

'It's the other way,' said the Obersturmbannfuhrer, following closely behind Zim.

When they made it back to the room, Zim was surprised by the sight of some very familiar papers spread out on the table, with the bespectacled fuehrer reading over them. 'What are those doing here!' he shrieked.

Fritz hurried over to Zim. 'Zim, the fuehrer is very impressed by your weapons and tank designs. Why don't you explain your genius to him?' Fritz had learnt that flattery, no matter how insincere, was one of the best ways to get Zim to do anything.

'Yes, you wouldn't be able to figure them out for yourself.' Zim went over to the papers.

'This is my tank design.' He looked at it proudly. 'I based it on your old Panzer tanks, but it's much better than they are. It's able to stand a direct strike much better and-.' Zim was cut off.

'What is this weapon?' Hitler asked, rather brusquely, pulling a blueprint design from the pile.

Zim was taken aback slightly by the tone, but recovered himself. 'That's just a laser rifle.' It was just a plan for one, and Zim knew that the humans didn't have the electrical power needed to make one that could be portable. They were also lacking most of the materials needed to make it powerful enough to be effective. He had tried often enough when attempting repairs on his spiderlegs. 'It's not very good for war.' He leaned over and shuffled the papers, pulling out a single, almost incomprehensibly scribbled on design. 'This is much better.' He lay the paper out proudly, causing all in the room to look over interestedly. Only Fritz could make the smallest bit of sense out of it.

'What is it?' Hitler peered over the design, unable to make the slightest bit of sense out of it.

'This is an aplar cannon.' Zim grinned at it, and stared searching through more papers. 'and this is a aplar gun.' He pulled out a blue print for a gun that looked vaguely similar to the tommy guns of previous years. 'If you had these weapons to use then the war would be over in a few weeks. Nobody would be able to stand in your way, and the world would be yours by the end of the decade!'

'Hmmph!' Hitler was not pleased with the designs, or Zims boasts. 'That is an old weapon. We got rid of these years ago, replaced them with more up-to-date technology.' He laughed. 'And you have a cannon design. They were out of date before the last war. If this is the best you can come up with, then you can't be as intelligent as they say.'

'What!' Zim was shocked. 'If you have these weapons, the war will be over by next year! Nothing on the planet could come close to these guns, and nothing can protect against them.'

'Why? What is in these "aplar guns" that is so special?'

Zim grinned. 'Aplar guns fire a really really good melty liquid thing.' He waved his hand around to try and get the message across to the humans with words they didn't have, or he didn't know. 'It melts, eh, or burns everything it touches, really quickly.'

'Can it burn through metal?'

Zim laughed. 'Metal? Of course it can burn through lead.' He was still chuckling.

'How long would it take you to make it?' Hitler was looking at Zim in absolute seriousness.

'Uhhh...' Zim was caught off balance. 'It may take me a while... I don't know what chemicals you have that could be used to make the aplar liquid, or even if you have the right chemicals and materials for storage. Maybe a year?'

'You have eight months.' He turned to Fritz. 'You will make a model of this tank by February, and I want to have them on the production lines and in Russia by June.'

He stood up and shook the Obersturmbannfuhrer's hand. 'If anything happens to prevent the new guns from being made, you will be held responsible.' He turned to leave the room.

'Hey! Hey! Wait!' Zim had thought of a question. 'What if I don't have it made in eight months?'

Hitler shrugged. 'We'll give you over to the scientists.' He left the room, with his guard following him on his heels.

Zim collapsed to his knees. He was going to die.


	15. Chapter 15

Haven't forgotten about it, just had other things to do.

Zim was extremely worried. More worried than when Squishy had eaten Almighty Tallest Miyuki (and then Spork, but he hadn't been called on that). More worried than, well, Zim had never had any other reason to worry, up until now. It was two days after he had met Hitler, and things weren't going so well. He was working on a list of materials he would need to make an aplar gun, and was finding that humans just didn't have any of the components that he was used to. So far he was on his fifth draft of the list, and had brought in a human to help him compile it.

'You don't have polycarbon resin?' Zim was amazed. The only thing, other than thickened glass, that plasma wouldn't burn through and they didn't have it.

'No. We do not have any polycarbon resin. Or anything else you've asked about that I haven't known about.'

Zim put his head in his hands. A very human reaction, he knew, but still one that suited the situation perfectly. The humans barely had half of what he would need, and it would take too long to create from the individual molecules the other items on his list. Even if the humans had the technology to create from molecules, which they didn't.

'Just get me everything.' Zim said, finally.

'Huh?' The human asked. 'Everything you've got on your list? Or everything at all?'

'Everything! Get me every metal, chemical, mineral and gas you know of! Get me all of it!' The human started backing away from Zim, holding the list of absolutes close to his chest.

'That will take a long time, Zim. Some things are only found in countries that aren't trading with us. It will probably take a long time for everything to arrive. Why don't we just work on the list a bit more?'

'No!' Zim screamed. 'No! It would take too long.' He didn't want to admit his ignorance of human chemicals, having never really paid much attention to them in science. 'Just get me everything you can.' He looked at the human, standing in the doorway clutching its papers. 'Shoo.' He waved it away, watching it run out the door.

Then he turned back to the desk, and started to work on the designs for a heavily modified and simplified version of the aplar gun. He really did hope it was a problem of not knowing the human names for things he needed, instead of them not existing at all. If they didn't, his job would be a lot harder. He compulsively clutched at his shirt, and the squeedily-spooch within. He would have to start thinking of an escape plan, though it would be easier now he had ready access to chemicals. Maybe some sort of gas...

-----

Three days later Zim was fretting. He hadn't even received a quarter of the materials that were necessary. This could not go without complaint. 'Hey!' He shouted, getting the attention of the human who had been with him in the previously silent room.

'What?' He got a rather grumpy reply, as the human looked at the recently dropped flask of chemicals, which were spitting and hissing against the floor. It would have to be cleaned up, now.

'When will my stuff arrive?'

'Within a week.' the human said, despairing as the liquid ate through the mop and up the handle. 'Is this aplar?' he pointed towards the puddle of liquid with the remains of the mop.

'Eh?' Zim hopped off the chair and moved over to examine the puddle. He poked it with a finger, then pulled back quickly, shaking his slightly burnt fingertip. 'No. No. Mop it up and start again.'

'Are you sure?' The human was slightly scared of getting near the puddle. It seemed to be growing, and emitting a rotten smell. 'Can't we just leave it to destroy itself.'

By now, Zim was also starting to look a bit worried. 'What did you put in this?'

'Just what was on the list!'

Zim grabbed the stick from the human and started jabbing the puddle, letting go when the ooze grabbed the handle and yanked on it. 'Aaaaaah!' He screamed.

The human looked around himself wildly. Zim was trying to fend off the puddle with a chair, but failing as more and more of his defence was eaten. He spotted a matchbox on the nearby table and lit it, dropping it onto the blob, which went up in a silent explosion, which disappeared almost as soon as it was lit.

Zim dropped the now singed chair to the floor. 'When will the supplies be in?'

The human collapsed against the bench, holding his chest, which his heart was trying to escape from. 'Soon. I don't think we should try anything else until they arrive, though.'

Zim frowned, and poked at the ashy remains on the floor. 'Write down that experiment number twentyfive was a failure. And get working on number twentysix on the list.' He looked up at the dumb-founded human. 'Get on with it.'

The human nodded, and started to prepare another mixture with shaking hands.

-----

Seven days later Zim was looking at a selection of glass jars and metal canisters spread out on the table in front of him. He picked up a lump of metal and threw it from hand to hand, grinning. This was going to be fun.

He put down the lump of metal and picked up a bottle from the table, unstopping it and taking a sniff of the fumes emanating from the inside. He started gagging on it, and quickly re-stoppered the bottle, placing it back on the table.

'Are you done yet?' The human asked, bored after watching Zim rush around the bottles like a kid who had been left alone in a candy store and told to "be good." After the first five seconds, everybody knew the kid would be stuffing its face and pockets with as many sweets as could be reached.

'Eh? Oh, ah, yes. Yes!' Zim picked up a bottle of sulphuric acid. 'Put some gloves on, and start working on mixture number 455.' He held the bottle out towards the human.

The human sighed and slipped on a pair of heavy leather gloves. He carefully measured out a precise amount of the acid Zim had handed over, and then a smaller amount of the next liquid Zim produced from the benches and cupboards and floor. Slowly stirring them together over a flame, more ingredients were added as Zim handed them over, all in a very precise order, as they both kept a close eye on both the recipe and the mixture.

The human had once asked Zim why he didn't mix the ingredients himself, and was told that, because Zim was using unknown chemicals, the results would also be unknown. Zim didn't want to be near the mixture if it went critical and exploded, or ate the surrounding area. He also didn't trust human protective garments, and so just stayed as far away from it all as he could.

The human snuck a quick glance at Zim. Of course, this was all decided after Zim had added the sodium to water, and got burnt by the subsequent explosion. And the other two times he did it after that.

'Zim?' The human asked, as a measurement that Zim had not translated into human measures cam up. 'What's hu-hyu-hyuopl-?'

Zim snatched the piece of paper out of the human's hand, as it had been picked up to further examine the word. He then looked at the measuring tools that were neatly laid out on the desk. 'Two of those and a half of that.' He pointed at two of the smallest measures on the table, and returned the paper to the desk.

The human shrugged and added the powder that Zim handed him into the bubbling, spitting mixture. The result was instantaneous: nothing. The mixture stopped bubbling and spitting, and turned a noxious brown colour. Zim 'oooooh'-ed at the result. 'Clean it up and get the next one ready.' Zim then ran off to the table to write out more instructions, using the results from the previous to help.

-----

Zim grinned. He was already about four months into the project, but he was sure he finally had it. The formula that would create the mixture needed. 'Human!' He shouted out, to get the attention of his assistant, who had gone quiet a while ago. 'Human!' Zim shouted again, when the human wasn't forthcoming.

He glared around himself at what he now realised was an empty lab. Where had the human got to? Maybe he had left to eat something. Zim stood up, and decided that it was probably time for him to eat as well. He left the lab and was marginally surprised by the lack of light in the hallway, but thought nothing else of it. The humans were always doing strange things.

When Zim entered the empty break room, he wondered if something was up. The break room usually had one or two people in it, eating, thinking or procrastinating. Zim thought for a few moments, then realised: maybe the humans were sleeping. Checking the clock on the wall Zim saw that it was 2:00, a time he remembered that humans often slept through.

Zim growled. Curse the human need to waste a third of their lives by sleeping and recharging. He marched out of the break room, and then back towards the lab. When he reached it he passed it to the next room, which was where his assistant slept. Zim hadn't let him have enough time off to go back home to sleep, so a bed was set up in the next room.

The door was slammed open, startling the human awake. 'Zim!' The human gasped out, sitting up sharply, 'what do you want?'

'The amazing Zim has figured out a way to fix our problem with the mixture. You are required to work.'

'Couldn't you have knocked? I told you, it's not appropriate for you to enter my room while I'm sleeping.'

'Eh?' Zim was slightly confused, but then he remembered. 'You're a female! Of course.' He chuckled lightly. 'I forget you're not just deformed.' Being at about chest height in front of her naked body had helped him to remember about the human gender differences. Of course, it was so easy to forget, everybody else in the building was a male, so why should he have to remember to treat this one differently. His last helper had been a male, before the accident with the poison gas, and the one before that. 'Come to the lab when you've finished dressing.' He closed the door behind him, and marched back into the next room.

Five minutes later she arrived in the room, and looked at Zim. 'You think you got the formula right?'

'Yes.' Zim replied. 'It cannot fail this time!' He ignored the many previous times he had said that exact same thing, only to end up with a dully coloured blob in the bottom of a beaker, or a substance that ate itself up before they could even see it.

'Alright. Where's the recipe?'

Zim grinned, and handed over the ten pages of formula he had figured out.

-----

Seven hours later they were both looking at a test tube filled with a semi-solid liquid. Zim grinned, and the human looked confused. 'Is this it?'

'Yes. This is it.' He held the test tube in his hands, then frowned. 'Now we need to make the gun.'

'And what do we do with that while the gun is being made?'

Zim grinned, and threw the liquid at the wall. 'I'm getting out of here.' He then ran over to the now barely there wall, and stepped out onto thin air. He was prevented from falling by the human grabbing the back of his shirt and dragging him back from the brink.

'Did you forget that we're on the fifth floor?'

'No. No, of course not.' Zim straightened his shirt out. 'It was all part of my plan, which you have now ruined!'

'The plan to fall out of the window and break your neck? I guess that would be one way to escape.'

'No, stupid human! Zim was going to, uh... land on that truck.' He pointed out the hole to a truck that was thirty metres away.

'Okay.' The human turned back to the lab bench.

'Human!' Zim shouted, to get her attention. 'The wall will need to be fixed now.'

'Yes, Zim. I'll get a maintenance man onto it.'

'And don't just put it off for weeks! I don't want any water getting in here.'

'Yes, Zim.'

'Good. And clean up the bench.'

'Yes, Zim.' She pulled the cleaning supplies from their home in the cupboard and started washing used beakers and tubes. 'Oh, and Zim?'

'What?' Zim was pulling at the edge of a brick, judging the destructive force of his liquid. It would be better when it was placed in a gun and really charged up.

'Do you know my name?'

Zim glared at the her. 'Just get back to work.'

-----

For the next two weeks Zim worked alone. He had sent the human out to find more non-breakable materials he could use to contain and shoot the plasma they had created. So far all he had managed to make were noxious fumes that forced him to not only get rid of his human assisstant, but also forced him out of the building and into the courtyard.

Zim growled as he started to mop up his latest disaster. There was only 1 month left on his deadline, and he couldn't afford any more failures. Not only that, but his options of metals, plastics and mixes was slowly falling. Soon he wouldn't have anything left except for the humans suggestion, and he would not take that route, not if he could find a better solution first. Throwing away the used mop, he turned back to his bench. He just needed to find a strong, non-corrosive metal with a high melting point. He threw the remains of the alloy he had been using onto the junk pile, and looked at the small beaker of plasma he had resting on the table. A small piece of pure unobtanium was resting on the bottom, and had barely corroded in the two weeks it had been sitting there. While Zim had immediately called for more of this metal, the humans had told him it would be impossible as it so rare to be almost non-existent.

Now Zim was looking for a way around this problem, and had come up with nothing. The best idea he had had was to put a small layer of it in the barrel and holding chambers of the gun, but had been told it would be extremely difficult to come up with the quantities needed to make that effective for mass-production of the guns. Zim took this to mean that he couldn't use the metal at all.

After going through nearly all the humans metals and alloys he had come up blank. They were all useless for keeping plasma in, and while this meant that it was effective, it also meant that his job was a lot harder.

'Hey, Zim.' Zim bristled at the sound of the humans voice. He was having enough problems without her _suggestions_.

'What?'

'I made more plasma for you, in case you needed it.' She stepped down into the dip that Zim had managed to create in the stone flooring. 'Not having much luck finding a suitable metal?'

'Zim is having plenty of luck.' he answered.

'Have the unobtanium deposits in the world doubled and moved to Germany, then?' She returned, placing the plasma on the table, and turning around the leave.

Zim glared at the human, resisting the urge to pick up the beaker and throw it at her face. That would just lose him another assistant and a fresh batch of the liquid.

'Just tell me when you're ready to admit that placing it in glass balls would be the best way to transport and fire it. I've already made some in my spare time, so don't tell me it isn't workable, either. All you'd need to do is find a way to fire them without breaking the balls until contact is made.' She handed over a small glass ball filled with the same liquid that Zim had been trying so hard to contain.

Zim picked up the small ball and placed it in an empty beaker. 'Go and work on something.' He dismissed her, and she left, trying not to show how much she was sulking. Why wouldn't he just listen to her idea?

Zim picked up the ball and threw it at a far wall. After wandering over and examining the impact radius, he decided it may be a suitable way of delivering the plasma to the target. All he had to do now was create a gun to fire them without causing them to break, and he would be done.

Zim started to laugh in triumph. This was a great idea of his! And then, when he had made the gun and allowed these humans to win the war, he would be given the respect he deserved, and rule over them all for the good of the Empire!

'-eh, heh heh.' Zim slowly lowered his fist, and looked around at the guards and various personnel staring at him. 'Get back to work!' He shouted at them, running back to his table to start work on designing the new guns. First he would need more of those ball things to examine...


	16. Chapter 16

Zim was playing with different ways of safely transporting the glass tubes when the order came. 'Why should I have to go to the obersturm person's office?' He asked of the human who had brought him the message.

'I don't know, but I was told to tell you that if you didn't come you were to consider yourself already arrested and on your way to be experimented on.'

'I didn't say I wasn't going to go.' Zim protested hurriedly, but the soldier had already left the room. 'Bertie!' Zim shouted at his assistant, 'think harder. I'll be back soon, and want you to have figured out the problem.'

'My name's not...' Bertie sighed, giving up before the fight started. 'Yes Zim,' but Zim had already left the room.

'Sir! You wanted me?' Zim said when he reached the office.

'Yes. Have you finished the gun yet?'

'The gun? What gun?'

'The plasma gun. The gun you've been working on for the past eight months, that you had to have finished by today.'

'Oh, that gun.' Zim started thinking fast. The deadline had just come along too fast. 'Well, I er... It's nearly done! Bertie is too slow! She has set me back by, uh...' Zim did some faster thinking. 'Two months. Yes. Just two months more, and it will be finished.'

'I can't give you two more months, Zim. I can't even give you two more days! It was supposed to be finished by today. I'll just have to hand in the report and say that it's not been completed.' He shook his head. 'The higher ups won't be pleased.'

'No! Just give me a few more weeks! If I'm not allowed to finish it, then all my work will be wasted! You'll lose the war!'

'I can't give you a few more weeks! If I fail to hand in my report on time, I'll lose my job! And you'll be killed any way.'

'No! No, just tell them that it will be finished in two more months.'

The obersturmbannfuhrer put his head on his hands. 'I'll ask for them to give you more time. However, it had better be completed in two months, ready for you to give a working demonstration to the men I ask to come in and view it. It had better be completed fully by then, with any kinks worked out of it.'

'Of course.' Zim said, quite relieved to be given two more months to finish the gun properly, and to stay alive. Zim turned to leave.

'And Zim?' The human dragged Zims attention back. 'Your tanks are going well. They're needed in Russia, and the mechanics are saying that they should be ready for mass production within the next few months.'

Zim frowned. 'Why are they given longer than me? I should be given the same amount of time as they are to complete my gun.'

He shrugged. 'Timetables are changed, unexpected difficulties are run into, extra changes are made to designs. All sorts of things that they gave me plenty of notice about, so I was able to get them more time to solve it. They're thinking of calling it the Tiger tank.'

Zim glared at the human, realising there was a criticism in there somewhere, but not knowing quite where. 'I'll have my gun ready before their _tank_.'

'Okay, Zim. You do that.'

Zim left and hurried down the corridor. He needed to get Bertie to work harder! She spent too long eating and sleeping anyway.

'Zim!' The human shouted as he entered the lab. 'I figured out how to make it work! We have to use cotton!'

-----

One month and 28 days later...

Zim grinned as he held a completed plasma gun in his hands. It was a very primitive model, made out of wood, metal and cotton, but it worked as it should. Most humans commented on how close to an old fashioned Tommy gun it looked, but Zim just said that was so it could hold the Plasma canisters.

Zim pointed it at the target on the far wall and pulled the trigger, very delicately as it had a habit of jamming and breaking the glass balls inside. He grinned as a wet stain darkened the wall. They had replaced the plasma canisters with just plain water ones for testing, which just made everybody a lot happier, especially the people working in the labs next to Zims.

Zim fired off another shot, hitting the target dead centre again. And in just two more days he would be able to show off his brilliant invention to the fuehrer himself! The praise he would receive would be unimaginable! He would soon be able to take over this planet, first by using the Nazi's to win the war, then destroying their leader and taking over for himself! He laughed and pulled off another shot, growling as the gun jammed.

He removed the bullet barrel and took it over to the sink, emptying the contents down the drain, making sure not to splash any water on himself.

'Jammed again?' Bertie asked, as she entered the room, eyes red from having just woken up from her first decent sleep for one month and 28 days.

'Yes. We should fix it before the test happens. It should work perfectly when I show it to the fuehrer.'

'Of course.' Bertie said, thinking the exact same thing. 'But if we don't work the kinks out, I'm sure you would still be willing to show faulty equipment to the fuehrer.'

'Ehhhh.' Zim hesitated. 'We won't have to think about that, because the final gun will not jam. I won't allow it to.'

'Okay, then. Let's get to work on it. Where do you think the problems come from?'

2 days later...

Zim was frantically putting the plasma gun back together. The showing was in 2 hours, and he still wasn't sure where the jam came from. Hopefully in the remaking of the gun it would just disappear.

'Still can't find the jam?' Bertie asked, bringing in a cup of intensely sweet and milky roast-acorn coffee-substitute that Zim had ordered her bring to him.

'No! And you're not helping, either! Give me that screwdriver.' Zim pointed to the screwdriver on the table.

Bertie put down the coffee and handed Zim the screwdriver. 'I could put it back together for you. I am more than just a coffee girl.'

'No, no. I'm nearly done.' Zim started whacking the gun with the handle of the screwdriver.

'Are you sure? You haven't stopped working for over a week. Sit down and take five minutes to drink your coffee substitute. The showing is still two and a half hours away.'

Zim looked at the clock, and then at the mug on the table. He did deserve a break, and five minutes couldn't really hurt. Not really. He picked up the mug and started sipping on it, while Bertie continued remaking the gun.

'See? Just a small break won't hurt.'

Zim nodded, then fell off the chair.

Bertie grinned and looked over at Zim as he lay on the ground. She could just put him in a cupboard until the showing was over, and then get all the praise from the scientists, and finally be recognised as the genius that the government didn't allow her to be. But she had to hurry, because there was only a half an hour before it began.

She dragged Zim into a cupboard and started putting the finishing touches on the gun. There wasn't really much left to do on it. Maybe when she became famous she would have Zim working for her. So long as he never learnt she had drugged him and set the clock back two hours, and how could he? He wasn't that insightful.

After completing the fixes, she looked up at the clock. Time to run! She couldn't miss her "date with destiny" as the English said. After today, nobody would ever forget the name of Josephine Eck!

-----

Bertie arrived at the testing room right on time. 'Where's Zim?' The Obersturmbannfuhrer hissed at her.

'He's been working on this for two weeks straight. He passed out from exhaustion.'

The Obersturmbannfuhrer shook his head. Unreliable aliens. You'd think he would have kept awake for a few more hours. Zim would certainly get punished for this. 'Very well. You can carry out the demonstration.' He turned to the gathered scientists. 'Gentlemen? Please allow me to introduce Josephine Eck. She will explain the concept of this weapon, and then demonstrate how it works.' He turned towards her. 'Josephine?'

'Thankyou sir.' Bertie turned towards the gathered scientists and people of importance. Time to start the spiel. 'This gun, which was developed by my coworker and I, is used to shoot...'

The ubersturmbannfuhrer left the room. He didn't understand most of the terms used, so his time could be much better spent in his office. He sighed. Going over the piles of paperwork that never seemed to shrink, and the requests that were always put in for funding. He really needed an accountant.

-----

Two hours later Bertie had finished her speech and answered any questions that the audience had come up with. She was slightly surprised Zim hadn't shown up yet, but the broom handle she had pushed through the door handles was probably helping to keep him in the lab. 'Now I will demonstrate the effectiveness of our "plasma" liquid.' This got the interest of the less scientifically minded members of the audience.

'If we could all go out to the courtyard, where the targets are set up.' She left the room, leading the audience behind her. She grinned. This would cement her place in history.

'First I will show how well the balls work without any artificial projection.' She picked up one of the plasma balls from the case that she had carried them in. Lobbing it at the closest target, she grinned as 'Ooooh's and 'Aaaah's sounded from the group behind her. The target had been eroded to little more than a thin piece of wood.

The audience went over to the target, noting the way the screws had been disintegrated as much as the target had.

'However, throwing the balls does not have the same amount of reach or force as using the gun does.' She picked up the gun and loaded six balls into it. 'If you could all stand behind me?' She indicated for them to all get away from the targets.

She indicated the furthest target. 'I will be using this gun to reduce that target to little more than a stump of wood.' She aimed it carefully and then pulled the trigger, slowly and carefully. The projectile sped out of the gun and smashed into the wooden board, eating away at it with such speed that it took only one second for the entire board to disappear completely, leaving only a few posts and some glass shards. Bertie grinned in pride. 'As you can see, there is nothing left of the target. But I want to prove to you all that it is as effective against metal as it is against wood, so, I will be shooting that solid metal target next.' She indicated a dull grey target that had been made out of the remains of tanks. 'If somebody would like to examine the target to make sure that it's solid?'

One of the soldiers went forwards. He examined the target all over. 'Two solid inches.' He called back, returning to the group.

'Good.' Bertie aimed carefully and squeezed the trigger. Nothing happened. 'Oh, fu-' She was cut off as the gun exploded.

The Obersturmbannfuhrer was staring out his window when the explosion happened. 'Oh no.' He quickly went running down to the courtyard, being narrowly beaten by soldiers who had be distracted by the commotion.

'Sir!' One of them pulled off a salute as he came running towards the Obersturmbannfuhrer.

'Are there any causalities?'

'Seven were dead when we arrived here, sir. And four have got serious wounds, both from the liquid and from shrapnel.'

'What about the others?'

'They're fine.'

'Find Zim, and get him here straight away.' The soldier nodded, and set off running.

The obersturmbanfuhrer weent over to the bodies. 'Ugh.' He had been on warfronts before and seen his fair share of dead bodies, but some things you could never get used to. 'Cover them up.' He looked down at the only body wearing a skirt. The entire top half of her was gone, and others just had parts of their bodies missing. He tried not to look too hard at the one missing the front of his head. A little voice at the back of his head said "at least you know it works." He pushed that voice aside with rationality and fear. He had just killed at least seven higher ups in the scientific administration. He needed a scapegoat.

'Where's Zim!' He shouted out. A small, green scapegoat would be good.

'Should we search for him?' The sergeant asked.

'Send out as many men as you can spare. I want him to answer for this.'

'Yes, Sir.' The corporal hurried off the get men on the job, not wanting blame to be placed on him if they couldn't find Zim.

-----

Zim, meanwhile, was just waking up in his cupboard. He had been in the process of waking up for the past fifteen minutes, and was just starting to realise that something may be wrong. The something wrong of not having fallen asleep, but having woken up in a small, dark area. He knew it was a small area because he could feel wood pressing in on his body from all sides.

Bertie! Bertie must have locked him in the cupboard to make him look bad. He would be late for the showing! 'That stupid treacherous human!' He shouted, kicking at the rattly part of his wooden prison, hoping that it was a door. 'I'll kill her!' He landed another kick on the door, grinning as the wood creaked under the force of the blows.

'Hey!' There was a voice outside the cupboard that distracted Zim from destroying the door. 'Is that Zim in there?'

'Yes! This is Zim! Let Me Out!!!!!!!' He kicked at the door again, to get the point across.

The soldier grinned. 'You might be less eager to get out when the Obersturmbannfuhrer finished with you.' He pulled the broom out from the handles.

'Eh?' Zim pushed open the cupboard door and crawled out. 'What are you talking about?'

'Your gun blew up.'

'My gun, but I haven't shown it yet...' Zim tailed off. 'Bertie! She showed them my gun without me!' That was low, even for a scientific institution. 'And she destroyed it! I'll kill her!'

'Yeah.' the soldier scratched his head. 'Maybe you should just follow me.' He left the room.

'She will regret ever crossing Zim!' He looked around and found himself to be shouting at the roof, then hurried off after the soldier.

After a few metres of walking Zim realised something 'this isn't the way to the office.'

'No.'

'This is the way to the courtyard.' Zim paused fr a few seconds while thinking. 'Did Bertie shoot the gun?'

'Yes.'

'Ooooh. How'd it work?'

'Uhhh... I'll let you decide that for yourself.' He picked up the pace, forcing Zim to jog to keep up with the longer legs of the human.

When they reached the courtyard Zim stared, taking in the carnage around him. 'Oh.' He looked up at the Obersturmbannfuhrer. 'At least we know it works. Eh?' He grinned, trying to ignore the way he was being glared at. This was going to mean trouble for Zim.


	17. Chapter 17

Zim was standing in front of the desk in the Obersturmbannfuhrer office. 'Zim, you are very close to being seen as a liability. If those scientists were better respected in their fields you would be dead by now.'

'So I'm safe. I can start working on the gun again. I think I know what the problem was-'

'No, Zim.' the Obersturmbannfuhrer cut Zim off before he got too deeply into his explanation. He found it impossible to get Zim to listen when he got too deep into his own conversation. 'The gun project has been shelved. We want weapons that don't have the possibility of destroying entire regiments when they misfire. The war would probably be over by the time you fix the problem, and you would have gone through even more assistants! We can't spend the time and money on a weapon that might not even work properly!'

'No! No, Zim can get it to work, just give me a few more months. It just has a few problems that need to be fixed. Nothing major.'

'Nothing major killed nine of our own people, Zim! It took up a hundred thousand reichmarks and will probably take a million more before the problem is fixed. That is major. You will be placed on the team working on the tank. As an assistant.' He added, seeing the look on Zims face. 'If I hear any complaints about you being uncooperative, or not working as part of the team, you will be sent to the scientists at Kugelstadt. This is your last chance to show that you're not worthless, Zim. Don't waste it.'

Zim nodded. He would be as helpful as he could, and not annoy anyone. 'I'll just go to the tank development area?'

He got a nod in reply. 'But, first, how are the plans for the space plane going?'

'The space plane?' Zim tried to remember what that was all about.

'Yes. The space-plane that you're working on the plans for. How are they coming along?'

'Ah, yes.' Zim remembered having started researching how he could build one given the humans current level of technology. 'It may be too expensive.'

The Obersturmbannfuhrer sighed. 'How come?'

'It would cost at least six times the total of the aplar gun just to develop an efficient method of propulsion and fuel. And then you'd need to develop computer guidance systems and a way to stop the entire thing from burning up in the atmosphere.

'Fine. The fuehrer would have forgotten about it anyway. Go to tank development now, and I don't expect to see you again for a long time.'

'Sir!' Zim saluted and left the room.

He was back 24 hours later, after having short-circuited the entire building and most of the surrounding city. 'Your switches are badly labelled.' Zim said in defence of himself.

'What were you doing anywhere near the switches?' The Obersturmbannfuhrer asked, tiredly. He had been having a long day, and Zim wasn't making it any easier.

'Oh.' Zim looked around himself. 'I was told to switch the circuit board to individual power to the tank room. But all your switches look the same.'

'So you flicked the wrong switch? That should have been easily fixed.' The power had been off for an hour already, with negative reports coming in from the electricians.

'No. I pulled them all at the same time.' Zim grinned.

The Obersturmbannfuhrer put his head in his hands. He was starting to get a headache. 'You're not to go near anything electrical. Or chemical. Here.' He wrote a note on a piece of loose paper and handed it to Zim. 'Give this to Fritz. I'll be talking to him later this week, so if I find out you didn't give it to him, you will be in more trouble than you have ever been in your entire life. Do you understand?'

Zim nodded, and grabbed the note, marching out of the room. He snuck a look at the note, which basically demoted him to the level of janitor, only able to fetch and clean and voice thoughts. He scrunched the note up, and was about to throw it away before he remembered about the doom that would fall on him if Fritz didn't get it. He smoothed it out and tucked it into his pockets. It had been just like this back on Vort. They had wanted to demote him there, as well. But he had shown them! He had made Squishy, and then they were so impressed that they promoted him to the army, into the "Cannon Fodder" regiment, which zim had always thought to be an odd name for a group that was allowed to go straight into the middle of a war zone, right at the front! Zim smiled at the memories. He missed being a soldier.

Ah, well. Time to get back to work. If he showed himself to be extra good at helping, then maybe he could do his own work again! Zim set off with renewed purpose. He would survive through this war without getting cut open, and could then return to working on his STORD, possibly with the financial backing of the Reich.

'Sir!' Zim shouted when he returned to the tank room, ignoring the groans that his work colleagues made at his arrival. 'Zim is back and I will do all that is needed of me by the empire!'

'That's great Zim. Right now the empire needs you to sit over there. In that chair. All the way in that corner. And not move from it.'

Zim nodded, and pulled himself up into the chair. 'Oooh!' He pulled the note out from his pocket and waved it in the air. 'Fritz! I have a note for you from the Obersturmbannfuhrer.'

'Fine.' Fritz grabbed it and skimmed over it. 'That's great, Zim. Could you make us some coffee?'

-----

Zim was bored. Absolutely, mind-numbingly bored. He hadn't felt this bored since skool, and even then he had been able to waste time on doomsday devices and fighting Dib. But right now he had nothing to do. Not a thing. Zim sighed and span a pencil round his fingers. 'Fritz!' He shouted out, causing Fritz to slosh his coffee.

'What, Zim?' He sighed and mopped up his papers.

'When am I going to be able to do something? I've been working for so long, and you haven't done any of what I've told you to.'

'We're still working on it. There are a few problems with your original designs that we're trying to fix, and you're not helping by constantly interrupting us. But you do make great coffee.' He tried to grin as he sipped at the lukewarm mug of burnt... stuff that Zim had given him ten minutes ago.

'Yes, yes, but when will Zim do real work?' He noticed the way the light bulb was flickering slightly at Fritz's desk. 'I could fix the lamp for you.'

Fritz stared at his lamp. Was it worth sacrificing a lamp in order to get Zim from out under his feet for a day, or even a few hours? 'Sure, Zim. You can fix my lamp tomorrow.' He looked at his clock. 'It's getting late now, Zim. Why don't you go to bed? Get plenty of rest, or whatever it is you do.'

Zim saluted and left the room. Detouring by the front doors (which were still guarded. The soldier waved at Zim as he passed), Zim ended up in his room. He had been in this one room for more than a year, and was starting to hate it. He hated the confinement and the accordion music. He loathed the way the room was so _human_. An irken room should not have a bed take up so much space, and everything should be much shorter so it was at a better height for him. He had pulled the back off the chair just after he had arrived to make sitting on it easier, but it still wasn't any good. He kicked the hated stone and rubbed his sore toes. A proper building should be made out of metal.

Zim left the room, slamming the door behind him. He climbed the stairs further up, and exited onto the roof. He liked the roof, when it wasn't raining, or windy, or likely to kill him in some other way. Zim sighed and stared up at the sky. He couldn't even see Irk from here, even when it wasn't cloudy.

Zim didn't know how long he had been up on the roof when he saw a brief flash of light off in the distance. 'Eh?' He pushed himself up on his elbows and looked out at what he realised now was the far off town.

Zim started thinking quickly. What could those brief flashes of light and slight exploding noises be? 'Oh.' He leaned back down and watched the explosions as the town below was bombed. He vaguely wondered if they would bomb the building. Though given the blackout situation put in place, they probably wouldn't notice it, anyway.

-----

Zim didn't know exactly how much time had passed, but the tank was in production and, bar one or two upsets (which included but were not limited to twice causing failures in the wiring of the tank, and leading to the deaths of four soldiers and two lab assistants), things were going smoothly. He had just received notice that he was wanted in the Obersturmbannfuhrer's office, probably so they could decide the best way to celebrate his achievements in helping the Nazis to win the war.

Zim marched down the corridor to the obersturmbannfuhrers office. He turned the handle on the door, then knocked and entered. 'Sir!' Zim saluted.

The obersturmbannfuhrer turned from where he was standing by the window. 'Ah, Zim. Good to see you could make it. Do you know why I called you here today?'

'To thank me for all I've done for the empire.' The obersturmbannfuhrer looked slightly stunned by the answer.

'Eh, no. Not quite. Today's you're last day with us here, Zim.'

'Oooooh. Am I going to go and work with the Hitler directly?'

'N-' The obersturmbannfuhrer started, before his brain cut in. Don't tell him the truth! Let him think he's going someplace nice! It'll be easier to get him going if he thinks that!

'Yes. You're going out to work with the... Hitler. You should go and pack immediately. There'll be someone to pick you up tomorrow morning.'

'Yes sir!' Zim ran out the door, excited to get to the centre of everything. He wondered if Fritz knew. He should hear about it, learning that Zim would be working with the best scientists in the Nazi empire.

He ran into Fritz's tiny, crowded office and beamed at him. 'Guess where I'm going!'

'I'm so sorry, Zim. I tried to put as positive a spin on things as I could but the deaths and explosions couldn't be-'

'What are you talking about!? Zim is going someplace better than this... place.'

'I guess it could be called a better place...' Fritz muttered.

'What did you say?' Zim squinted at the human.

'Nothing! Nothing, Zim. I must have got the wrong memo.' If the obersturmbannfuhrer lied to Zim, he thought, it's his own business. I shouldn't upset things.

'Was there anything else you wanted, while you're still here?' He looked almost as if he was about to cry.

'No. Nothing else.' Zim was starting to feel uncomfortable.

'Well, just look after yourself. No, uh, try to stay out of trouble, uh, I hope I'll see you after the war.' He held out a hand for Zim. 'Despite everything, I enjoyed working with you, and I'm so sorry to see you go. If I could have done anything...' He trailed off, leaving Zim extremely confused, which was an unusual state for Zim because he usually ignored things he didn't understand.

'You too.' Zim shook the human's hand, and left the room quickly, thinking over what the human had said. He was concentrating so hard he didn't notice where he was going and ran into Johann, who pulled away quickly.

'Ugh. I heard you were going soon. I probably won't see you again, at least not in one piece. We might hear you, though.'

'What are you talking about?' Zim demanded, wondering what this insane human was going on about.

Johann grinned. 'You're going to get taken apart, Zim. They'll stick things into you, and take things out of you. My only regret is that I won't be able to see it.'

'Stupid human. Zim is going to Berlin, not some scientist, dissecting place.'

'Berlin? I didn't know they did biological experiments there.' Johann said, unwittingly parroting Fritz.

'You're just jealous that I'm going to be working so much higher up the system than you.'

'You don't believe me? Hey Steve!' Johann called over a passing guard. 'You know Zim?'

Steve stared at Zim for a few seconds. 'Hey! Isn't he that idiot what blew up all those things?'

'Yep.' Johann ignored Zims protests at being called an idiot. 'He doesn't believe me when I tell him where he's going tomorrow.'

'What? Kugelstadt? Where they send the defects to be tested? Everybody knows about that. They've got some people in special to take him away.'

'See, Zim.' Johann said, but Zim had already left.

-----

Zim had fled as soon as the dreaded word "defect" had been said. He didn't remember exactly what had happened to the defectives of this empire, but it had seemed very harsh, even by Irken standards. Zim stopped by a wall. He had to get out of this building, but how? He had tried every single way out before, and unless he wanted to test how safely the Irken body can plummet down five or six storeys, he was best to keep away from the roof. He would use his spiderlegs, but they wouldn't be able to take the strain from catching him, or holding him as he climbed down.

Zim decided he would first go up to his room. If he wanted to escape, he might as well put on something less noticeable than his work uniform. He would get his old coat. It had served him well in the past and was less likely to draw attention to him.

Zim stopped as he was running for the door out of his room. He could hear in the not-so-distance the sound of enemy planes getting ready to bomb the nearby town and industrial area.

He grinned. Maybe he could use this to his advantage. He ran back to his window and ripped the blackout curtain from the panes, allowing the light inside to stream out into the otherwise pitch-dark night. Of course, one window wouldn't be enough to get their attention.

What would really get their attention is a hole in the wall. Zim grinned. A hole in the wall would be good. He pulled the mattress off his bed and flipped the steel frame onto its side. He still had a few vials of aplar juice in there, and by now it would be very old and unstable. Just one vial thrown at the wall would be enough to take it apart completely.

Zim picked up a vial to toss it onto the wall, but stopped before it could leave his hand. Maybe he should get behind some cover first...

He ran into the corridor outside the room, then tossed the vial in through the open door and crouched down behind the wall. After not hearing anything, Zim peeked around the door frame. Most of the wall was gone, as well as a good portion of the floor and the lower down room's wall. Luckily the light was still working, so now it was shining through a large gap in the wall, instead of just a small window.

Zim grinned and ran on to the next room, which luckily was open. Soon after it was even more open. Zim flicked on the light and moved to the next room, continuing on until he was out of vials. Then he leaned back and grinned.

An antenna quirked. Zim could even hear the planes coming closer. Soon they would be dropping bombs on the building, and it would all collapse in a pile of stone! He was about to start gloating about the amazingness of his escape; before he realised he hadn't actually gotten away yet. Zim took off running for the ground floor, racing the plane on his way down.

Zim wasn't the only one running at that time, as soldiers on outside guard had started to notice the light shining out from the holes in the side of the building. Soon the alarms started blaring, and the power was switched off from the main circuit board, but it was too late. The bombs hit the building.

Zim threw himself to the ground when he felt the first of the bombs hit. He could hear people in the distance screaming and shouting. This was the perfect time to make his escape, and he didn't have too far to go to reach the exit. All he had to do was dodge the falling masonry and then he could leave. Zim ran forwards, and narrowly missed being crushed by the ceiling as it came down in front of him.

'Aaaaah!' Zim span around, and dived out of the way of the falling masonry. That was one way out of the building gone, but if he just went the other way... Zim turned around to find himself staring at a terrified soldier.

'What is happening?' The soldier was gripping his gun close to him, as if it would protect him from falling buildings or bombs.

'The humans are bombing the building.' Zim answered. 'We must get out of here! You can lead the way.'

'I don't know how. Everything in that direction has collapsed' He pointed beghind him, in the direction that Zim had been hoping would lead to escape.

'Out the window!' Zim pointed at the window, and threw a piece of rubble at the miraculously undamaged glass.

'Is it safe?' The soldier poked his head out the window, staring down two storeys to concrete and rubble.

'Eh...' Zim peered over the edge aa well, and nearly fell out as another explosion hit the building. He grabbed the wall and decided that anything would be safer than staying in the building. He jumped out of the building, and brought his spider legs out to cushion the blow. They buckled and shattered almost immediately upon hitting the ground, but it was enough to prevent Zim from getting seriously injured in the fall.

When Zim got up he glanced around himself. Everybody was running around in a panic, screaming and shouting. There were a few people who were organising a fire hose and a few more who were starting fires, under the idea of fighting fire with fire.

After getting out of the way as the soldier from the corridor nearly squashed him flat, Zim ran off into the darkest part of the night he could find.


	18. Chapter 18

Zim looked out from where he had hidden himself. There was a patrol of soldiers nearby, out looking for deserters, or rebels, or something. Zim shuddered and crawled further back into the blackberry bush he had been hiding in for the past few days. None of the humans would follow him in there, even if they did see him. No one was stupid enough to go into the blackberry patch, except for Zim.

Zim thought about that sentence for a few seconds. Except for Zim, who was too smart for all the humans, and so knew what they wouldn't do. He peered out through some gaps in the thorns and watched as the soldiers shared some bread around. Zims stomach rumbled, reminding him of how long it had been since he had eaten anything. An Irken could only live on the nutrients from a PAK for so long before they started to run out. Especially if said Irken was also on the run at the same time. Zim stared at them as they toasted the bread, the smell of it wafting over him and making his mouth water. His stomach grumbled and he resisted the urge to run out and give himself up, if only for food.

Anyway, he probably only had a few more days to go until he reached France and his house, or Switzerland. Whichever of the two was straight South of Germany. Zim knew one of them was, just not which one. Whichever, he was sure to reach a neutral country soon. He had been travelling for three weeks already.

Three weeks with hardly any food. He could smell the coffee that they were starting to dish out. The coffee itself tasted awful, but the smell coming from it was the most delicious thing Zim had smelt at that moment. He whimpered quietly. Human food shouldn't be so tempting, but he was getting hungry and his PAK was low on nutrients. Maybe if he waited for the humans to sleep then he could get some of their food. It was getting dark so they should... Oh, no. They were packing up already.

Zim watched the humans leave and stiffly crawled out from the hole in the bush. He needed to find something solid to eat. That called for another trip into a town. Zim pulled the collar of his coat up as high as it would go, and slipped the old felt cap he had liberated from a clothesline over his antennae.

Setting off in the opposite direction of the soldiers, Zim followed the road until he reached a town. By the time he arrived it was closed up for the night, with shops and houses dark under the stars. Zim trotted over to the general store and smashed his elbow into the window at the front, wincing at the noise it made in the otherwise silent night. He would have to move quicker than normal.

After looting the small store of as many edible non-perishables that he could carry, Zim ran from the area, trying not to let a packet of biscuits fall from his hands as he fled through the shop window. A light had come on from the upper floors, and the owners would be finding the broken window soon. Zim really didn't want to still be around when they found the damage, and called the police. He had had a run in with a local police force earlier in his journey, and did not want to repeat the experience. Especially the part with the dogs.

Once Zim was well out of town, he took a break under the cover of road sign. There was an arrow on it pointing in the direction Zim was headed, with the words next to it painted over. It was the same all over the country, and Zim didn't want to admit it, even to himself, but he had no idea where he was going. He might even be headed further into German territory, or even into neutral or allied countries (not that the orientation of the country would really help him, just that they weren't searching for him). His internal map of Europe was also failing him, and he was starting to wish he had paid more attention during World geography, or at least downloaded a map into his PAK.

He got up and continued along the road, pausing occasionally to hide from passing soldiers. Finally the road Zim was heading down came to a fork. Zim stared down it, first one way, then another. The first way was very much like the road he had been travelling along: large and clean, with plenty of space on either side of the road. The second path was more worn, with little in the way of surfacing, and the bushes and shrubs much more tangled and over grown on both sides of the road. Zim gleefully headed down the second path, figuring that the fewer humans he would cross on the road, the better his chances of fleeing Germany would be.

Zim carried on down the road, feeling more and more confident about his choice as the road got further and further overgrown. No human would ever come down this path! Zim strode confidently onwards, still going as the sun started to rise and cast a pre-dawn greyness over the landscape. Zim did wonder if he should try to find somewhere to hole up for the day, but decided that the area was so overgrown no humans would be out here, and if they were he could easily hide from them.

Yep. Zim would be completely safe from all humans and human devices out here. He took another confident step forwards and froze as he heard something click.

'Don't you take one more step there.' Zim heard a voice behind him and felt a round piece of metal pressed into the back of his head.

He put his hands up in the human gesture for surrender. 'Don't shoot.'

'Are you working for the Russian traitors?' The voice asked

'No.' Zim replied, slightly confused. 'I have no anything with the Russians.'

'So you don't follow those bolsheviks.' The word was spat like a curse. 'Good. Come this way.'

Zim looked around. The way the human was indicating seemed to be more undergrowth. He pointed down the way he had been heading. 'I'll go this way.'

'No.' The gun poked into the back of Zims head again. 'You must come with us. I can't let you go now you know where we are.'

Zim was going to point out that he didn't know where they were, but the gun was rather insistently pushing him in the other direction. Zim gave up and followed the direction of the gun. Maybe he could just hide here for the rest of the war. If he didn't know where he was, then the Nazis would have even less luck finding him.

'So... You've been hiding here the whole war?'

'Yep. We've both been hiding here.'

'The whole war, huh?' Zim looked around himself at the tangled undergrowth. He could understand how somebody could escape from the Nazis out here. Nobody would want to come out here if they didn't have to.

'I said the whole war, and I mean the whole war! All of it!'

Zim looked around himself again. This was a reminder that humans could be useful. If he could just use these ones to hide him until 1945 came around, then he could go back to making his STORD!

Zim let the human prod him to a small cottage set deep in the woods. Zim whistled as he looked around it. There was a better set up here than he had had even at his own place. They seemed to be set up for whatever they needed. Food, wood, water. Zim shuddered. The well looked pretty deep from where he was standing.

'While you're here, you will work. There is a very important person living in the house, and we have to do all we can to make her life easier.'

'What!' Zim shrieked, 'Zim shall not work for some human-'

'You will work or die!' The gun was pushed right into Zims face. He could see the humans face turning red, and a whitening of the knuckles as the trigger was played with.

'Of course,' Zim pushed the gun from his face, 'if she's very important, I'm sure that working for her would be an honour.'

'Good. There's an axe over there, start chopping wood. I'll be watching, so do a good job.'

Zim nodded and wandered off to the woodpile. It couldn't be too bad, not if it got him away from the nazi's anyway.

It was dark by the time the human told Zim chores were finished for the day. Zim had already decided he was going to go in the night. Nazi's or no, he wasn't going to do menial task work for some humans. 'You go on. I'll follow.' Zim told the human.

'It's not safe out here.' The human pulled the gun off his back. 'Can't you hear them?'

Zim strained to listen. 'Hear what? I can't hear anything.'

'Shhhh! Listen. They're marching through the trees.'

Zim strained to hear. There were a few slight noises, but nothing like anything marching. The human grabbed his arm, and dragged him over to the house. 'Hurry up. We've got to get inside before they come.'

'Who?' Zim looked around himself. 'Nobody could find us out here.'

'The zombies. They come every night, but they can't open the door. We have to get inside before they come.'

'Zombies?' Zim asked, slightly scared. 'Where?'

The human ignored the question, pulling Zim into the house and slamming then locking the door behind them.

Zim looked about himself. House was too grand a description for the building he had just entered. By what he could see and smell, Zim decided there was just a single room to the building. One that somebody spent all day in, and didn't leave for any reason. He choked on the smell.

'Zim, I want you to meet somebody very important.' The human indicated a bunch of rags on the floor.

Zim peered at them, then jumped when it moved. Inside the rags was an old man, missing most of his teeth. The few that remained were as yellow as his eyes and fingers.

Zim took a few steps away from the human, finding out where the smell came from. He was glad most of the humans natural stench was covered over by the smell of old cigarettes and alcohol, though that couldn't cover the smell from the bucket in the corner. Zim coughed and wiped his eyes. 'Errrr.'

'Ma'am, meet Zim.' The first man introduced Zim to the walking skeleton. 'Zim, meet the grand duchess Anastasia.'

Zim looked around himself. 'Where?'

'Me!' The old man spoke in a remarkably strong voice. 'I am the only survivor of the Russian royal family, and will now be able to take back my kingdom!'

'Yes!' The first human agreed. 'Your army shall march on St Petersburg and take back what those bolsheviks stole from you.'

Zim squinted at the old man, sure that his researches in gender identifiers of human words hadn't gone so badly. Surely a duchess was a female. 'What army?' He finally asked. An army to take over Russia would have to be some great size.

'You two! You are my army. And together we shall take back my throne!' He threw the blankets off himself and stood tall. Zim covered his eyes.

'Of course, ma'am. The bolshevik rabble must have collapsed with in-fighting by now. I told you we would only need to give it a few months before your throne was restored!' He collapsed at the feet of the naked man.

Zim backed towards the door. They were crazy. 'No two humans can defeat the Russians!'

'You can!' The old man pointed at him. 'You are a sign from God that it is finally time to march on Russia! He told me I would be sent a midget to guide us through the mountains surrounding Russia, and lead us to victory!'

Zim tried to pull open the door, while still facing the humans, only to remember that it had been locked by the first one.

'Tomorrow, we will march on Russia! But first, we must sleep!' and so saying, the old man collapsed back into his blankets and fell asleep.

The younger human gave Zim a great big grin. 'Just think, by tomorrow, we'll become part of history.'

Zim stared at him in amazement as he collapsed down next to the old man. When he was sure they were both fast asleep he tore the door off its hinges and ran as fast as he could. When he thought he was far enough away he stopped and climbed a tree for safety. He could hear some screams far off in the direction he had run from, and didn't know if they had found he had escaped, or if the zombies had caught them, but he didn't care. He wasn't leaving the tree until the sun was well up the next morning. Then he was getting as far away from this area as he could.

Two weeks later Zim hit the coast. He had started to notice a change in environment the day before, as the smell of ground gave way to the stench of salt and water. The he noticed the dirt change from proper soil to filthy sand. Finally he saw the moon reflected in the water and cursed.

This was the wrong direction. Though his sense of direction was never wrong, he had been travelling in the completely opposite direction to France. He pulled out a battered map he had picked up earlier and started examining it. The coast was definitely not near France. Or Switzerland.

Zim stuck out his bottom lip, thinking hard. Maybe the map was wrong. If he just kept on going in the same direction, he would have to end up somewhere. Zim looked up at the direction he had been travelling in. Maybe if he just followed the coast, instead. He was sure that France had a coast, so if he got there, he could then travel across to his base. He nodded. That was the way to do it.

Zim looked at the map, then at the scenery in front of him. He would go West. Just keep on going West until he reached France. Or Switzerland. He shoved the map back in his pocket and turned to face west, then set off at a brisk pace, watched through binoculars by some rather curious and bored coast guards. Whatever the small figure was, they could ambush it as it went past. It would be something to do, rather than sit around watching the coast this far into German territory. It wasn't like any of the enemy boats would be around here, anyway.

Zim sat down and pulled his boots off, massaging his feet. The humans just didn't make boots to last. A good Irken pair could last a soldier decades, but the human pair had barely lasted him two months of travel. He had been walking sand into his soles for the past few hours, and it hurt. He dumped the sand out of the boots and then pulled them back on. Stupid, ill-made, human boots. He wished he hadn't lost his own pair.

Zim stood up, and looked into the barrel of a gun. He sighed. Not again. Why couldn't these humans just leave him alone? He verbalised the thought, and got poked in the eye as an answer.

'Come with me.' Zim pushed his hands into his pockets and followed in front of the human. He glanced about himself, looking for a way to escape the human, but the nearest cover was ten metres away, and he wouldn't reach it before the human stopped him. He had been stupid to leave the cover of the trees.

'Don't think about it.' The human had noticed Zims trying-to-be-sneaky glances, and come to the same conclusion as he had. 'I'll shoot you before you even make one step.'

'Fine. Where are we going?' Zim hadn't seen any sort of base when he had been walking down, and he hoped they weren't going on a boat.

'Just along here.' The human pushed Zim further along, and down a slope in the sand. He then knocked on a metal door set into the side of the dune, and Zim realised they had hidden their bunker in the sand.

'Ooooh. Clever.'

'Shut up.' The human reached over Zim and knocked on the door. 'You were found trespassing in a restricted area. You're in a lot of trouble, young man.' Zim slumped down and entered the bunker.

'Yes, yes. Just let me go with a warning, and I swear I'll never trespass into restricted areas again.' Zim knew he should have paid more attention to the signs he had passed.

'Uh-uh. We'll have to call the commander, and he won't be happy. Anything?' he directed the last comment towards the man who had been looking out the window.

'Not yet.' The voice squeaked in the same way Zims classmates had when they went through the change known as "puberty". Zim sniggered.

The man with the rifle indicated to the corner. 'Go and sit over there.'

'Go and sit in the corner?' Zim was indignant. They didn't think of him as a threat at all!

'Just get over there.' Zim went and sulked in the corner. He would have put up more of a fight, but didn't want to get shot again. The bullets really hurt.

The man with the rifle went over to the radio sitting in the other corner, placing the headphones on and taking up the microphone. 'Hello? Hello? This is base XX97Y. Can you read me?'

There was a crackle from the other and of the line. The human answered when it finished. 'We've picked up a trespasser on the beach. We were just wondering what we should do about it.' There was a pause. 'Uh, over.'

More crackling. 'Just a young boy with some sort of skin condition. Probably out to see what work we're doing.'

More static. 'Right. We'll do that then. Uh, over and out.'

The man turned towards Zim, slumped in his corner. 'We'll take you back to the base when our shift's over, then your parents can come and pick you up. Consider this to be your only warning. If you're found out here again, you'll be in serious trouble, do you understand me?'

'Yes.' Zim was amazed. He would get out of this without being found out!

'Good. Uh... Do you want a cup of coffee?'

There was a knocking on the door of the bunker. 'Time to go.' the teen squeaked. He looked at the clock. 'They're early.'

Zim stood up, eager to finally get back on the way to France. 'Finally.' He headed for the door, and followed the older man out of the building, running into the back of him soon after.

'Sir!' The older man pulled off a hurried salute. 'What are you...? Why did you... Uhhhhh...'

'Yes, I'm sure.' The higher up pushed him out of the way and looked down at Zim. 'We thought it might be you.'

Zim turned to run, but was grabbed around the collar by the human. 'You gave us quite a run around, didn't you, Zim?' He pulled Zim up until they were at eye level with each other.

'I don't know what you're talking about. I'm not Zim. I have never heard of this Zim.'

'But didn't you say that you were Zim?' the teen destroyed Zims carefully constructed lie with a sentence.

'Uh, no. No. Uh... Get back to your station!' He turned back to the human holding him. 'I am not ZIM! Let me Go! Let Zim go!' He started waving his arms and kicking his legs around, only to stop when he felt something heavy hit the back of his head and was dropped to the ground.

Zim look up, slightly stunned, first to see two men staring down at him, and then a heavy club being brought down onto his head.


	19. Chapter 19

Sorry about the late update, but my computer stopped working. Thankfully I had this all on an external drive, so it wasn't lost, unlike some other things.

Zim woke up in a small black room. His hands were cuffed behind his back. His clothes had been taken. He shuddered and curled up on the hard, thin mattress he found himself lying on as a few memories came creeping back to invade his sore head. Memories of waking up in the back of a moving car and getting beaten into unconsciousness again when he tried to escape. Then he had been injected with something when he woke up the second time. And now he was here, where ever here was.

Zim tried to stand up, but fell onto his knees as the non-visible world spun around him. He leaned against the wall until the spinning stopped, and stumbled over to where he assumed the door was. At least, it was area that a slight breeze was entering his room from, so Zim assumed it was a door. He was proved correct when the piece of wall he stumbled into was wooden instead of stone, and moved slightly when he kicked it.

Upon finding that the door wouldn't do anything else when kicked, Zim went back to lying on the mattress. He shuddered and was almost willing to admit to himself that he was terrified. He was stuck in an even more primitive time then the one he had come from, in the middle of one of the most torturous periods of the century, which Miss Bitters had delighted in telling them all the gory details about.

A few hours later, when the door was finally opened, Zim made an escape attempt which was thwarted when the guard stuck his foot out and Zim tripped over, falling on his chin and biting his tongue. 'Ow.' Zim groaned as he was pulled up. 'Hey, where are we going?'

The guard hit him in the back of his head. 'Don't talk.'

'Are you going to let me go?'

Another smack. 'Don't talk.'

Zim mumbled a few choice words, but continued on in silence. When the guard finally stopped Zim, he was finding it difficult to control his shaking. He took a deep breath as the door they had stopped in front of opened. In the room were two men in white lab coats.

'Remove his cuffs.' The order was given to the guard.

'Take a seat, please.' One of them indicated the only chair in the room. It had the same look as a chair owned by a demented dentist who took more enjoyment than normal in torturing patients. Zim stood in the doorway and wrapped his arms around himself. The chair was not going to be sat in. The scientist nodded at the guard, who picked Zim up and dumped him in the chair.

'No, no!' Zim tried to get up, but the straps on the arms came down to hold him in place.

'Don't worry, today we're just going to do a basic examination. Nothing too invasive.' The second scientist held up a large needle and grinned.

'Not yet, anyway.'

Two months later, when Zim was dragged out of his cell for the who-knew-what time he was less apprehensive. He could handle another day of being poked and prodded, scraped and needled, if it meant longer to wait until he was taken apart bit by bit. He was almost relieved at the sight of the chair in the room as he walked towards it, because it was a chair, and not an autopsy table as they had promised would come.

But then they continued on past the room with the chair. 'Eh? Hey! We're going too far!'

'It's a new room today for you.'

'New room?' Zim squeaked. 'What kind of new room?'

'I dunno. Just shut up and get moving.'

Zim went forwards with as much confidence as he could muster. He would escape now that he was going to a different part of the building. Where ever the building was. Where ever the exit was. Where ever the next turn was.

Before Zim could make his daring escape attempt they reached the next room along the hallway. 'We're here.' The guard opened the door and pushed Zim inside.

Zim stopped. Inside the room was an exercise machine and several electrodes. 'What- What's this for?'

'Just a test of endurance. While you can still run, you're going to. Run as far and as fast as you can.'

'When can I stop?' Zim tried to push the human away as electrodes were attached to his body.

'You can't.' Zim was picked up and placed on the treadmill. 'Now run!'

Five hours later Zim was seeing spots in front of his eyes. He stumbled and almost fell over.

'Keep running!'

Zims legs felt like gelatinous ooze and his breath was rasping down his throat. He took one more step then fell over, breathing hard and trying to get some air. The breath caught in his throat, and he retched and vomited.

He collapsed onto his side, whimpering and gasping. The scientist strode over and removed the electrodes from Zim. 'Take him back to his cell.'

Zim was picked up by the guard and carried back to his cell. He dragged himself onto his thin blankets, and wished he had more to eat than just filthy, poisonous water.

'Are you recovered from yesterday?'

Zim glared at the human. He hadn't done anything like that since training, and was still aching from it. 'I need food.'

'Yes, you'll get some eventually. Now then, on to todays study. Since you were so exhausted by yesterday, I'll keep today short.' He ran a finger along one of Zims antennae. 'Ever since I saw you I wondered what these were for. Since you've already told us, I just wonder about the structure now. You know there's only one way to find out about that.'

Zim tried to pull away from the chair, but the straps held him on. 'No! NO!'

'Hold his head still.' Zim felt two hands on either side of his head. One thumb was digging into his eye, but that was the least of his problems.

'Let go of me!' Zim struggled to get away from the humans hands. Then he felt his world get a little dimmer and a sudden pain in his head. Zim screamed and felt tears leave his eyes.

Zim felt the human place a something over the stump of antenna left on his head, it might have been a bandage, but he couldn't tell. He thought the human might have said something, as well, but couldn't quite figure it out. He felt the hands leave his head, and then the straps get removed from his arms and legs. He wiped the tears from his eyes and tried to ignore the pain.

Five minutes later Zim decided to try standing up, instead. He got off the chair without a problem and was able to stand straight. The guard came over to his side, ready to lead him away, but Zim pushed him away. He would walk back to his cell, and show them exactly what it meant to be an Irken invader.

Zim managed to take two steps towards the door before he realised exactly how much he relied on the information provided by his antennae. He shuddered; this must be what it was like to live as a human, with the only input coming from the eyes. He closed his own to stop the swaying of the world, opened them again, and walked into a wall he hadn't realised was that close.

He looked around and saw the door to his left. Putting his hand on the wall he followed it until he reached the opening. The guard finally came up behind him, and, with a hand on Zims back keeping him balanced and going in a straight line, lead Zim back to his cell.

Two hours later some bread arrived in Zims cell. Zim managed to crawl over to it, before dragging himself back into his bed, where he stayed until he was dragged out for more tests.

Zim peered in the direction the door with his one remaining eye. He stood up and stumbled towards the door, having finally learnt how to compensate for his slowly regrowing antenna. He pushed at the solid wood of the door, then started scratching away at it with his fingertips.

He needed to get out. Get out straight away, get away from the knives and the scissors. Zim started scrabbling more furiously, tearing the skin off his fingers and re-opening the wound from his missing one.

'Let me out, let me out, let me out, letmeout, !' Zim started kicking at the door along with the scratching.

He suddenly spun around. There was somebody in the darkness with him. He flicked his antenna, trying to sense the air disturbances created by them. He couldn't see them, couldn't feel them, but he knew they were there. He backed into the corner. They wouldn't catch him from behind.

Unless they could go through walls.

Zim shuddered again. They would get him anywhere. They might be watching him now, plotting a way to get at him. He screamed a war cry and ran into the opposite corner, hitting the wall and laughing. They had fled from him. Or were they merely toying with him, trying to get him into a false sense of security.

Zim looked around himself again. He couldn't see them anymore. Couldn't feel their invisible eyes on him. He dove down beneath his blankets. If they couldn't see him when they came back they may think he wasn't in. They'd leave him alone, go on to kill all the humans instead.

Zim grinned from between the blankets and the floor. Maybe they would kill him. It couldn't be too bad to die. Hadn't the primitive Irkens believed when a warrior dies they go afterwards, not just to the Amalgam? Anywhere had to be better than this place, anyway.

He stuck a hand out of his cocoon, then hurriedly pulled it back in. The watchers were back. He wouldn't let them see him cowering like a... like a human! He got out and stood up proudly, wobbling slightly on unsteady legs. He put a hand out to the wall to steady himself, but found the wall had travelled 90 degrees in the other direction. He hit the floor heavily, not sure if his eyes lost focus with nothing to focus on.

Zim stood up and tried to find the wall. Where was the wall? Where were any walls? He ran around, couldn't find a wall. No walls, no doors. But it was too close. He could feel them peering at him. How could they see him in this dark? Maybe they had stolen his walls. They had stolen his walls and his door. How would get out if there was no door? How could he escape if there were no walls?

Zim fell to his knees, trying to feel the floor. Where was the floor? They took the walls, the door, the floor. What was he standing on? No! If he thought that he would fall through the floor. But where was the floor? He stretched out his hands, trying to find anything.

Something soft. His blankets? No. No. Something else. Something squishy, and squirmy, and smelly. He screamed. A corpse, a germy, decaying, infested corpse. Zim fell away from the body.

Then he was back in the room. The watchers had gone, perhaps pleased with what had happened. Zim reached forwards. Soft; just blankets. He crawled into them, pulling them well over his head. He wondered what would happen next.

'Hello Zim! And do you know what day it is?'

'Day?' Zim shuddered from where he was strapped into the chair. 'Day we die.'

'Not today, not today. In fact, today is a day of celebration! The day of the birth of our Lord! A very special day.'

Zim looked up at the human. 'You're death and pain!' He was entering a semi-lucid moment. At least he could tell that the scientist was talking to him. 'I celebrate nothing you like!'

'Traditionally, we give out gifts at this time. I have something for you.'

'Eh? A gift for Zim?' He laughed weakly.

The scientists looked at each other. The quiet one shrugged. 'Well, here you go.' The scientist pulled something out from behind his back.

'A parsnip! Give! Give to Zim!' Zim wriggled his hands from where they were strapped down.

'If you promise to be good, we'll unstrap your hands. Do you promise?'

'Yes. Zim promises. Now give the parsnip.'

The two scientists unstrapped Zims hands, then handed the parsnip to him. Zim hungrily gnawed at the vegetable, it being the only real food he had been given all week. He quickly finished it, then looked up. 'More. More!' He paused. 'Pl- pl- pleh- Please?'

'There's no more, Zim. But now you need to give us something.'

Zim looked around himself. 'Zim has nothing.'

'Yes, you do. You have knowledge. Do you know what we found in your finger?'

'Finger?' Zim waved his hand. 'Took my finger.'

The scientist held Zims hand in his own. 'Yes, and you haven't been taking care of your hands, have you?'

'Escaping. They'll get me. They're watching me.'

'Who are?' The scientist asked, good-naturedly.

Zim frowned. 'Don't- No. No. Nobody, they can see me.'

'Of course they can.' The scientist felt he was losing Zim and the conversation. 'Can you still hear me, Zim? Can you answer me?'

'Zim- Zim knows.'

'Oh, uh, good. That's good.' He patted the hand in his grasp. 'Do you know what we found in your fingers?'

Zim frowned, as if this was the most difficult question in the world. 'Bone?'

'We still have you, then. Very good. No, we found a claw. Did you know you had claws in your fingers?'

Zim stared at his fingers. 'Old. Not used anymore.'

'Can you still use them?'

Zim shrugged. He didn't know, but they had all been told that claws weren't needed, not with modern Irken technology. If you used them, you were defective, and primitive. But he had tried.

Zim grinned at the human, then swiped at his face, leaving two long cuts from one side to the other. The human fell back with a cry, blood leaking between the fingers he held against his face. The guard rushed in, and Zim grinned. He knew he wouldn't have to put up with the humans for the rest of the day.

Zim lay on his stomach, running a diagnostic on his PAK. He didn't know how many volts they had sent through him, but he knew something in his PAK had broken. Or something had been broken before, and was now fixed. Zim shook his head. Something had broken. Something had definitely broken.

The results came back. Everything was running at peak. Zim frowned at this result. Maybe the diagnostic tool was broken. He would have to fix it...

Zim slammed his fist into the floor. He couldn't fix it. Not here, not now! He couldn't fix anything! It was broken, and couldn't get fixed. It was defective; his PAK was defective. He was defective.

'No! NO!' Zim shouted, trying to prevent himself from thinking like that. He wasn't defective! He was not crazy! He would not go crazy again! He wasn't crazy right now, and he would stop it from happening again! He was Zim! He could stop it.

He stretched out and stood up, leaning against the wall as his legs threatened to give out. He took small, stumbling steps over to the food he had ignored earlier, which he had thought was going to try to eat him first.

Zim fell onto his knees in front of the bread, reaching out a shaking hand towards it. He quickly picked it up and stuffed it into his mouth, ripping off what wouldn't fit, and shoving it in when he had swallowed. The bread was quickly followed by the milk, which was sloshed as Zim tried to finish it all before somebody came to take it from him.

When Zim finished the food, he looked about himself, glancing into the darkness surrounding him, making sure nobody was going to get him- 'No!' There was nobody there, nobody at all! 'NO!' He kicked the wall, then hopped back to his bed, clutching his bruised toes and collapsing onto the mattress.

Zim watched the door to his cell open. This was the first time in a month, or an hour, or possibly a decade it had happened. Zim stretched out his hands, looking at his finger stumps in confusion. Hadn't he had more fingers yesterday, or two hours ago, or last year?

'Are you okay?' Zim looked up at the human in the door. When had he got there? Surely the door had only just closed.

'You.' Zim pointed at the human. 'You- eh. you-' Zim wondered what he was saying. Was he even saying anything? It didn't sound like a real language. He tried again. 'You. You. You.'

What had he been going to say? He looked up. Oh, there was a human in the door. When had he gotten there? Zim squinted at the human. Maybe it wasn't a human. Maybe it was another eye-lie. A hallucination. Zim stood up to confront the hallucination.

Then he looked at his feet. They seemed so far away. Had he grown? He must be taller than the tallest. He peered at his feet again. Or maybe he was shrinking. His feet did seem to be coming closer. He looked up at the human. 'Muh.' He fell to his knees, then onto all fours.

Something wasn't right! Zim looked up to the light, seeing nothing in the door. Maybe he could get out?

Get out? but where was he? Zim stumbled to his feet and tripped towards the door, falling outside of it. The corridor seemed to be travelling up and down, swaying like a boat on water.

Zim whimpered. Was he on water? He didn't like water. He saw some humans come down the corridor, running towards him. They were wearing white coats. Zim felt fearful of them. Them and their white coats, which were often splattered with his green blood. He tried to push one aside as it touched him. Fell away from the hands. The walls spun as Zim fell. He vomited, a clear, colourless liquid falling from his lips, burning his throat and his hands.

Zim whimpered as he fell again, fell onto his side. What was wrong? What was wrong? He found himself screaming the question at the humans, who held him and lifted him. Took him away to the room with the chair. Then tubes were shoved down his throat, into his spooch. removing the liquid and his food. Zim mumbled and tried to take it out, only to have his hands restrained again.

A hand stroked across his forehead, and the scientists started talking to each other. Zim heard but couldn't understand them.

'We should have kept him under constant surveillance.'

'Nothing had been happening! Not for the past six hours!'

'You should be lucky I noticed something was wrong.'

'Yes, thank you for doing what we told you to.'

'Said we shouldn't have given th...'

The voices blurred out and Zim stared at the ceiling. There was something in the corner. It was looking at him! LOOKING AT HIM! He struggled to get out of the chair, away from the thing that was staring at him. He couldn't escape! COULDN'T ESCAPE!

A face entered Zims view, blocking him from the staring thing in the corner. Zim stared at the new face, watching the eyes melt out of the sockets, leaving great black holes stARING AT HIM! Zim tried to turn away, but great big hands (hands? They were claws! Tearing, rending, fleshy claws, eating away at his skin, eating his braIN! lIKE A ZombIE!). The mouth opened, the sides melting together like cheese in the sun. The lower lip fell from the creature (the ZoMBIe!), exposing teeth and bone. Hideous teeth and skin and bone, spit flying from the mouth, burning like acid. Zim could feel it, eating away at him, the hands, the spit.

Zim stared into the blank eye-spaces and screamed.

And Screamed.

And SCREAMED!

Until finally the thing went, and Zim felt himself passing into darkness.

Zim curled in the corner of his room, shuddering with a blanket pulled round his shoulders. He twitched, staring at the door. Nothing was coming in, nothing was going out. He giggled. No in, no out, no in, no out.

Zim twitched, staring at the door. Was there a light under there? No. There was never a light. No light, unless it was shining in his eyes. He couldn't see, couldn't hear, couldn't feel. Zim giggled. Sans everything.

Zim twitched. There were eyes in the corner! Unseen eyes! Zims breath came in pants. If they couldn't see him, he couldn't see them. He couldn't see them! Where were they!

Zim twitched. He was never getting out. He was going to die here. Get torn apart by the humans, and would never see the Tallest again, they would never know what he had done for them.

Zim twitched. No. Oh no. No no no no no.

Zim screamed.

Zim stared at the table in the centre of the room. He felt a fear greater than he had felt before. Greater than when the Voord had come to his room, tortured him and stole his eyes. Greater than when he had been locked in the room with the water, then had some forced down his throat. Greater even than when they had been chopping him up, stealing what they wanted, these humans, these scavengers, these skrit.

Zim managed to break away as they tried to strap him to the table, but didn't even reach the door as large hands grabbed him, and his malnourished legs gave out. Then he was forced down, with leather straps around his arms and legs, holding him to the table.

Zim felt a cold, sterilising liquid getting wiped across his chest, down his stomach. Zim closed his eyes, wishing this was a hallucination, praying to some half-remembered Irken deity that this was a hallucination. Knowing that it wasn't, and knowing that knowing it made it true. Zim shuddered; not even the eyes had come to watch him die.

Then the blade cut in, and Zim couldn't even scream.

Zim lay on his blankets, barely conscious and hardly moving. A thick, dark seam ran up his chest, marking where the scalpel had cut into him.

The door was open and the guard was watching Zim, ready to make move in case Zim woke up and tried to hurt himself, or accidently hurt himself. Despite everything, they didn't want Zim to die. Didn't have the funds or equipment needed to give him adequate care after his surgery, but still didn't want him to die.

The guard lit a cigarette, trying to distract himself from remembering the smell as he entered the operating room. Or the way what he had come to think of as "his" freak had looked, small and alone on the big table. He would rather be here than the war-front, though. He knew it was going badly. All but lost, he had heard whispers of. At least here he could help, or at least, try to help.

He took another look at Zim, lying on the blankets. Poor bastard. Maybe he would die and it would all be over for him. No more screaming, or crying, or getting dragged from his room to be experimented on.

The guard took a long drag on his cigarette. Maybe he should end it. Smother him while he was out of it, so he didn't know what was happening.

The guard stubbed out his cigarette. Of course, the war would be over soon, and maybe he'd get free. It would all be over soon, one way or another.

The American soldiers poured down the stairs of the building they had recently liberated, and partially destroyed. 'Stop right there!' Bobby "Richards" McGee shouted out towards the back of the guard who had just exited a room with a heavily built door.

The German guard put his hands up. 'Don't shoot.' He said in roughly accented English. 'I surrender.'

'Give me your gun.'

The guard took his gun out of its holster and slid it across the room.

'Now down on your knees!'

The guard frowned as he tried to figure out what was being said, but the movements of the rifle gave him an idea as to what he should do. 'Don't shoot.' he repeated.

'We'll see.' The soldier indicated the door. 'What's behind here?'

After a few moments the guard shrugged. 'No thing.'

The soldier rolled his eyes. 'Sure.'

'Hey, Richards! What are you doing!' The shout came from down the corridor, as a younger man appeared round the corner.

'Nothing. Just found a lying piece of German scum.' The kicked the helpless guard in the stomach, forcing him to curl up in a ball. 'Hands up!' The gun butt hit the back of the soldiers head.

'Come on, prisoners are being rounded up upstairs. You should get moving.'

'I should.' He shot the guard in the head. 'But I want to find out what's behind this door.'

'Fuck! Richards! You just shot him! He gave up, he surrendered! You can't just shoot him!'

'Are you going to do something about it?'

'I'm going to tell the sergeant. You can't go around shooting prisoners.'

Richards shrugged. 'I shot him to protect you. Or maybe I shot him just too late to protect you, and he got to you first. Your choice.'

The younger soldier stopped as he was turning around. 'Okay. The sergeant won't hear about this.'

'Good. Now, help me open this door.' Richards was wondering what could be so important that a guard was seeing to it in the middle of a battle. He had heard the tales of Nazi gold, silver and amber. He could make himself the richest man in America, just by the contents of this room. He searched the guard's pockets as the young soldier, Private something-or-other, tried to open the door.

'Here, use this.' Richards tossed a set of keys to the soldier, who fumbled and almost dropped them. 'Idiot.'

Finally the door was open, and Richards looked inside eagerly, seeing nothing. He threw the door open, illuminating the room. Still nothing, not even a single mark.

'Stupid Kraut.' He kicked the guards body.

'Hey.' The soldier put up a feeble protest against the mistreatment of the dead, then looked inside. 'I think there might be something in here.'

Richards snorted. 'You can keep it.' He turned and headed down the corridor, going further into the complex.

The young soldier watched him go, then entered the small room, heading towards the pile of rags he had noticed in the corner. Pulling them off, he quickly turned around and headed back out the door.


	20. break 2

Guest written by Alan Smithee

Dearest Darla,

While I know I'll probably reach you before this letter does, I just have news that is too exciting to wait.

We're getting a child!

My squad found him in -, and the commander, having heard of our situation, said I would be able to take him back to America when my leave came through, as we don't quite know what to do with someone like him, and I seem to have made quite an impression on him. We will both have to fill out a few forms when I get back to make the adoption legal, but we should be able to take him happily.

However, there are a few things I should let you know about this child before I get there, so it won't be too much of a shock to you. He has been tortured by the nazis, and so looks almost inhuman, and has a few mental problems as well, like your Uncle Bertie.

Because I can only write one page, I will finish there, but I will be looking forward to seeing you again.

Love Geoff.


	21. Chapter 21

Short this week, though not as short as the last post. Enjoy!

Zim woke up, breathing heavily and with wide eyes, which narrowed quickly due to the light streaming in from the window. He wrapped himself up in his blanket and curled up on the mattress, trying to calm down after the nightmare. Zim put his head in his hands and groaned. He shouldn't have fallen asleep last night. He should have tried to stay awake. If only he had the tools to fix his PAK, and stop it from degrading any more.

There was a banging on the door. 'Zim! ZIM! Time to get up. It's your shift!'

Zim jumped up and stared at the door. His job. Of course. At least work would be a distraction from thoughts, and he wouldn't be able to go to sleep again as well. He climbed off the bed and towards the clothes he had piled in a corner. Pulling on his shirt and large floppy hat, he opened the door and stumbled out of the room. 'Coming, coming,' Zim mumbled, as he dragged his feet down the stairs.

At the foot of the stairs Zim entered into the small back room and storage area of the general store he worked in. Sitting on the bottom step Zim picked up his boots and put them on, not bothering with the once white socks that were lying next to the boots. He then grabbed his stool and took it out into the larger front area of the store. This front section of the store was jammed with food, washing equipment and other essentials of life. The radio in the background was playing a jazz song Zim recognised from a record he had heard a few years earlier, when he had been staying at the soldiers, his "fathers", house.

'You slept in again, Zim. M'wife would have been expecting me home 15 minutes ago.' Zim ignored the human's usual complaint. He was usually late for home anyway, having a stop off for a 3 hour lunch at the pub on his way. 'I'm suprised you even could sleep, the noise you were making.'

Zim growled. He didn't like being reminded of the time when he was sleeping. He didn't even like to think of it. 'I'm here now, so you can go to your "wife."'

'I'm going to,' he was reaching for the door. 'You really should, uhhh... If you t...' He trailed off, both because Zim was glaring at him, and because he never knew how to broach the subject. He nodded at Zim, then turned and left the shop, thinking about his strange employee. Zim had turned up about 6 months ago, looking for work and some place to live. He had given Zim the job to free up some more time for himself, and let him sleep in the spare room upstairs for a reduced rate of pay.

It was only later that he found out about his employees past and the reason for his unusual appearance. Since then he had been trying to help Zim as best he could, but was finding it hard. He never knew what he could do to offer for help, and he didn't think that Zim would be willing to accept any help from him anyway. He was now more thankful than ever that he had been too old to enter into active service during the war, though he had done what he could to help. He sighed, thinking of the son he had lost on the Ardennes.

He didn't know what young Steve would have been like if he had survived and come home. Maybe he would have been like all those other young boys who had come home as old men. He had seen the looks on the faces of the men down at the pub when they had had too much to drink, and he had heard stories from them. Tales of the death camps, where people were worked to death and incinerated in great ovens. The effect these places had on the soldiers was bad enough. He couldn't even think what it was like to have lived through it. He couldn't imagine what it would have been like for a child to have to endure even half of what he had heard of.

Then there were the times when Zim wasn't in the shop when he opened it in the morning. He usually didn't wonder too hard about it, attributing it to something to do with his experiences, but he did sometimes wonder, especially after he had asked some of the other men. What would Zim be doing wandering around the outskirts of town at nights?

Zim sighed, idly tapping his fingers on the wood of the counter. He had already completed all the jobs he needed to do today, and some more besides. There were only so many times a day you could sweep before the store couldn't get cleaner.

Looking up at the ceiling Zim wondered if he could perhaps just go back to bed. Though the nightmares terrified him, he was still so tired. Maybe he should try to get a good sleep one night, just so he wouldn't have to sleep so often. He could even stay in tonight, rather than go out again. Yawning, he laid his head on his hands and closed his eyes. When he had nothing to do in the shop it could get so boring.

Zim was dozing lightly when the door opened and the tinkling bells woke him up. He jerked upright and fell of his stool. Getting off the floor quickly, Zim peered over the bench to see who had entered. 'Oh, ah, Petty.' Zim made his way back onto the stool and greeted the customer. 'What do you want?'

'Oh, I just needed to pick some milk up.'

'Milk, huh?' Zim asked, wondering what the human was doing in the shop this early in the day. Usually the farm workers didn't show up until after they had done whatever they did on those farms. Zim wasn't too sure what happened, but knew it involved cows. 'Shouldn't you be playing with the cows or something?'

'Well...' Petty leaned in close to Zim, and lowered his voice conspiratorially. 'I'm on my way to the army base. On a very important mission. We found this... stuff lying on the dirt in one of our paddocks. Thought it might be theirs or something.'

'Stuff? What sort of stuff?'

'There's silvery stuff, and rubber and everything. I've never seen anything like it in my life.'

Zim didn't doubt this one bit. 'And it fell in one of your outer paddocks?'

'Towards the back of the property.'

Zim was already glancing towards the door. 'You had better get going then, can't let the army men wait.'

'Yeah.' Petty placed some cash in Zims outstretched hand. 'Bye, Zim! Oh, hello Mrs. Nichols!'

Zim stared at the door as the old woman entered. He would just get her sorted as soon as possible, and then he would be done.

30 minutes later and Zim finally cleared the last of the humans out of the shop. He followed close behind them, flipping the sign on the door to display "Be back soon". Seeing that sign always made him feel more relaxed about sneaking out from work. He just wished he had had it when he worked at shloogorg's. When he finally made it back to the empire, or at least to his own time, he would definitely bring the "Be back soon" sign with him.

Zim then ran off down the street in the direction of the human's farm. If he got there fast enough, maybe, just maybe he could beat the army and take what was needed before they even arrived. If the ship wasn't too badly damaged he could be in France by the end of the day, and back in the future by the weekend!

If he could get there without dying first. When he still wasn't far enough down the road, Zim had a stitch in his side and his legs felt like jelly. He wished he had fixed the chain on the bike he had acquired from the shop owner. It would have been much easier to pedal than to run. His short legs just weren't cut out for it.

Zim finally stopped halfway to the farm, putting his hands on his knees and dragging in great gasps of breath. He would have liked to curse his bike, or his PAK, or his legs, but couldn't get the words out. After five minutes of breathing Zim started on again, this time at a pace no faster than a jog. He was starting to feel very positive about arriving at the farm before the army. In all the time he had been going he hadn't seen any sign of them passing him, or being ahead of him. Zim sped up his pace slightly, so he could make sure he got there before the army did.

Twenty minutes and one shortcut later Zim arrived at the other end of the farm, only to see the army men load something silver and shiny into the back of their van.


	22. Chapter 22

Zim snuck slowly over to the army vans, keeping out of sight of the humans as they wandered around. As he got a closer look at the stuff on the ground, he could see that there wasn't enough for it to be a complete wrecked ship. Zim frowned. The rest of it had to be somewhere, but he couldn't remember enough of what Dib had wittered on about in class to know where it might be. Zim thought for a moment. In all his nights going out searching for it, he had never come across anything that might be a crashed ship. Maybe it hadn't crashed yet. But then what could this be?

Unless the army already had the crashed ship at their base, and were just picking up some scattered pieces that they had missed earlier! Yes, the humans must already have the ship. It was the only explanation Zim could think of. Now he just to think up a plan to get to the army base without the humans noticing him.

Zim looked at the humans from behind one of the trucks. Maybe if he managed to get to the base before the humans, and then sneak in past their gates behind them. But that wasn't a good plan. He didn't think he'd be able to run all the way to the army base; not after how tired he had been getting here as well, and he didn't have any human form of transportation that would allow him to get to the base before the humans did.

He stared up at the truck he was hiding behind. Or, he could hide in the back of the truck, and get a lift into the army base that way. He looked up at the heavy canvas covering. Though it would be very dark in there, he would have access to the material that they gathered from the site, and could examine it to see if it WAS part of a crashed ship. Though it would be very dark.

Zim took a deep breath and pulled himself up into the back of the truck, wriggling between the canvas and metal that formed the wall. Immediately he was hit with the overwhelming blackness and the smells of old human sweat and canvas. He took a step backwards and came up against the canvas walls. He quickly shoved his head out through the gap he had come in, taking deep breaths and trying to get the smells out of his memory. He would have to stick with the first, less good, plan of getting into the army base, rather than going into another of those _things_ again.

Suddenly Zim realised that the noises from the soldiers in the field had stopped. He peered round the corner of the truck, to see that the soldiers had started to lift up the material and were carrying it towards his hiding place.

Zim froze and thought quickly. If he jumped out of the truck now, he would be spotted, either by the farmers when the soldiers left, or by the soldiers while he was hiding. He wold have to revert back to his OTHER plan, and brave the insides of the truck for as long as it took to get to the base. Zim pulled himself back into the insides of the vehicle, telling himself that he was completely safe here and tucking himself into a dark pocket of excess canvas that had been left on the floor.

After what seemed like hours, but was probably only a few minutes, the soldiers finished packing the material into the truck. When he was certain that the job had been finished and there were no soldiers in there with him, Zim pulled himself out from the cover of the canvas. After doing so, Zim finally got a look at the material the humans had picked up. It was a silvery colour, and very light between his fingers. Zim frowned. It didn't look like any sort of alien technology he had ever seen before, and he knew more about alien machinery than any humans would. Possibly more than most aliens did.

It did seem very familiar though... Zim couldn't quite place where he had seen it. It was on the tip of his mind. He fell onto his bottom as the truck rumbled to a start, and then Zim remembered. He had been out patrolling one night, about, ooooh, 35 years ago, and he ran into this human thing in the voot. It had been a great big silver balloon, and nearly caused him to crash by obscuring his sight.

'This is not alien rubbish!' He shouted, then clamped his hands over his mouth when he remembered that the humans might be able to hear him above the noise of the engines. Stupid Dib. Stupid humans. It was just a crashed balloon. That was an entire trip wasted, and now he had no idea how he would get back to the future, other than waiting for it.

'Bah! stupid filthy humans.' He cursed again, this time in an angry whisper. And now he was heading towards an army base. Zim stopped at that thought. He was heading towards an army base. He would have to get out before he got there. Get out before they found him and caught him and tore him apart piece by piece and locked him away in a small black room again. He would have to jump from the truck.

Zim looked out through the gap in the canvas. His truck wasn't the last one. If he jumped out now, the soldiers would see him, and they would chase him, and he might hurt himself in the fall and not be able to escape and they would catch him and experiment on him and get locked up with no air or light or food.

Maybe he could escape when he got to the army base. Yes. Yes! He would escape at the base. They wouldn't know he was there, so he could hide from them and then escape when it got dark and the humans fell asleep.

Zim grinned and settled back down for the rest of the ride.

Finally the truck stopped. Zim tensed up and peered through the gap in the covering. He appeared to be in a big shed, and couldn't see anyone in view. He poked his head out a bit further and looked around to make sure the coast was clear, then dropped out of the truck and scurried back underneath it, just in time to some soldiers boots march around the side of the truck and stop where he had just been.

Zim pulled himself further away from the edge of the truck as more soldiers came. He flinched as one of them climbed into the body of the truck and loud stomping sounds were heard above his head. He tried to keep to the back of his mind memories of the last time he had hidden beneath a truck to escape the attention of soldiers. At least this time these ones weren't looking for him.

Then a crunching, crinkling noise came from above, and the balloon was clumsily shoved into the waiting hands of the other soldiers. Zims eyes widened as pieces of it fell off the main structure and fell to the ground. He hoped they wouldn't bend down and pick it up.

'Nah, don't worry about it, I'll get it later.' Zim relaxed as he heard the soldier in the truck, who then jumped to the ground. The soldiers started to move off when a shout came from the right.

'HEY! You weren't thinking of leaving that there were you!'

'No, SIR!' The soldier who had previously been in the truck turned to face the shouter. 'I was just picking it up right now.'

'That's what I like to hear.' He waited a few seconds. 'Well then, get on with it.'

'Yes, sir.' Zim saw the soldier get to his knees. 'Sergeant I'm so much better than you because I went over to Normandy, and I fought the Jap-' His dissatisfied grumblings continued until he looked under the truck to see if he had missed any pieces, and saw the back of Zims legs running towards the back of the shed.

'HEY! HEY! There's somebody there.'

Zim started running for the far end of the shed, where there plenty of boxes, crates and oil drums lying around. He heard some humans running towards him and managed to squeeze himself behind a stack of old crates, pulling himself further away from the entrance to the pile.

'There's nobody here. Get back to work.' The sergeant finally came marching up to the scene.

'But we saw something. It was short and hid behind these boxes.'

'Well there's nothing here now, and if I catch you wasting time like this again I'll make sure you all spend the next month washing toilets with your toothbrushes! Now get back to work!'

The soldiers moved off, still grumbling dissatisfiedly, but knowing the sergeant was more than willing to carry out his threat.

When Zim was sure that all the humans had left the shed he pulled himself from the cramped position behind the crates, hiding within an old and dusty pile of boxes instead. Zim smiled, curling up within his hole. He had outwitted the humans once again. They would never find him in here, and he would be able to escape when the humans left.

Zim was starting to relax when he heard two humans walk past. 'Just a weather balloon' one of them was saying to the other.

'Hardly seems worth the fuss, really.' The other replied.

'Yeah, but what's really interesting, is what made it crash. It seemed to be damaged as if it hit something.'

The other soldier laughed. 'Benny, you need to stop reading so many trashy novels. What, you think it's men from the moon, or something?'

The first soldier blushed. 'Of course not, but we have picked up that anomalous thing on the radar. It could be related.'

'Yeah, well, you just need to wait a bit longer. The team will be going out for it tomorrow.'

'I guess I'll have to wait. I'd love to be part of that team though...'

The humans walked out of hearing-range. Zim peered from behind his barrels. He had to find out where this thing was, or follow the recovery team. Maybe this trip to the army base wasn't a waste after all.


	23. Chapter 23

When he could hear less humans, Zim gratefully crept out from behind the boxes. he had barely been able to stand the confines, airlessness, dust and lack of light that had come with his hiding place. But now he was out he could find where the recovery team was! And by this time next week he could be down in his cellar in France, putting the final touches on the STORD! Everything was going smoothly.

After looking around cautiously, Zim ran towards the nearest truck and dived underneath it. He was now closer to the door of the shed, and would be able to leave and hopefully find the recovery team before it left. Now, where would the recovery team be hiding? Zim peered around again before leaving his hiding place and darting over towards the door. He put his hands in the gap between door edge and wall and pulled. Then he pulled again. Then he put both his hands around the side of the door, and heaved with all his strength in the direction that he had seen the door roll previously. Then he realised that the door must be locked from the outside. Then he used a human word that was deemed appropriate for the situation.

The hands were dragging at his skin, transformed into metal tools by their owners. He could feel the blood in his throat, and gagged as it turned into water and ate away at his stomach and lungs. The eyes were staring at him, promising worse horrors than those he was suffering at the moment, threatening to destroy his mind and eat him slowly from the inside out.

Zim woke up, sweating and with claws digging into the material of the seat he had fallen asleep on. Where was he? What was happening? He blinked and looked around. Slowly he came to remember where he was. He was in the cab of one of the trucks belonging to the human army, and must have fallen asleep, despite his best attempts not to.

He sighed and rubbed his eyes. He would have to get out of the area before the humans came back and found the seat that he had torn up in his sleep. Which brought him back to the original problem: how was he going to leave the shed?

As Zim was pondering the question the answer appeared, opening the big door at the front of the shed. Zim perked up and stared out the window, grinning. All he would do was keep out of sight until the human passed him, then run out the door when it wasn't looking.

He ducked down as the human stared around the inside of the shed. Zim hoped he was going to enter, and not just stand in the doorway, staring around. Finally he heard footsteps echoing on the cold concrete floor as the human entered the shed. He frowned at the sound. It almost sounded as if more than one person had entered, which would make escape harder.

Deciding to risk a quick look, Zim glanced out of the window in the car door. There were too many humans out there. Too many humans and they were too close. What if one caught him? He shook his head to get off that line of thinking. If he didn't pay attention he WOULD get caught. Thinking quickly, Zim decided that his original plan would have to be discarded because of all the humans, and squashed himself between the back of the car seats and the wall of the cab.

Not long after he had done this, one of the soldiers came and opened the car door. 'Urgh, Stupid recruits.' He muttered, pushing at the lining of the seat. 'Hey Harker! The recruits have torn up the seat!' Zim closed his eyes tightly and grimaced. He had completely forgotten about that.

'Then fill out a form and stop complaining. It couldn't have made the seats less comfortable, anyway.'

'Stupid recruits.' The soldier grumbled again as he got into the cab. 'I bet they won't even know who did this.' He sat in the seat and Zim gasped as he was pushed into the wall. Stupid heavy humans.

The truck rumbled to life and set off, only to come to an idle a few seconds later. Zim felt the back of the truck descend as extra weight entered, and saw another soldier get into the passenger seat. He squirmed further back to make sure the human couldn't see him.

'Everybody ready?' The driver asked, recieving a reply in the affirmative from the newly arrived passenger.

'Good, then let's go and find us this anomaly!' He kicked the car off, following after the other trucks.

To Zim, squashed within the confines of the increasingly hot and stuffy car, the drive felt interminably long. However, the ride did eventually end, and it was to Zims relief when the driver got out of the seat. When the passenger finally got out Zim unstuck himself from the back of the seat, gratefully stretching his stiff limbs. Then he had to dive back behind the cover of the seat as a soldier walked past.

'Right, time to head out! The target is half a mile from here. We'll be walking there, and want to arrive before it becomes any hotter, so let's move out and no dawdling!'

Zim grinned, hearing the soldiers move off. So they weren't going to be staying in the area. He could easily just slip out and follow them to the site of the ship, then gget in it and go before they even got there! he allowed himself and short cackle, which attracted the atttention of the sentry he didn't know had been left behind to guard the vehicles.

Zim swung the door open, smacking it into the sentry who had come to check on the noise, who doubled over, winded. Seeing the sentry curled on the ground Zim ran for the tree line, not stopping until he almost ran into the soldiers at the back of the line, then quickly flattening himself behind a tree. Zim followed the soldiers in this manner until the progression halted.

Zims eyes widened as he peered out from behind his current tree. Before him was the first piece of advanced technology he had come across in the long, long, long time he had spent in this timeline, on this damned backwater planet. The length of time spent here was so depressing he had even started to swear in their language!

Zim sighed and stared up at the ship. He could never remember seeing one like it before, and couldn't help but wonder what it would be like to drive it. It certainly looked a lot roomier than his voot. He vaguely wondered what had been piloting it, knowing it must have been an inferior species to Irken (not that any species was better than Irken) to crash on such a pathetic rock.

After taking in the sight of the ship, Zim stared around at the humans. They didn't seem to be doing anything, just milling about, trying to get the idea of the superior alien ship into their tiny heads. While they weren't looking Zim ran around the edge of the group of humans, looking for an unviewed part of the ship that he could climb up.

Reaching the back of the ship, Zim found that none of the soldiers had made it around yet. Looking around, he slowly walked up to the ship, then reached out and hugged it. He had never been so happy in his entire life. Here was his way out of this time zone, or even just off this planet. He could go anywhere now he had a ship. Finally letting go of the ship, Zim brought out his spider legs, hoping that they would be able to get him to the top of the ship, where there would likely be a way in.

Reaching the top Zim stared around. There were trees everywhere, except in the direction the ship must have come from. He kicked the ground he was standing on, hearing a satisfying "dong" come from the metal. He gave a short laugh then kicked it again. Then he laughed for longer and louder. He was so close to getting home!

'HEY! DID YOU HEAR THAT!' Zim stopped laughing as he realised that the soldiers were still around, and could still hear him up here. He then decided it was time to get into the ship. Zim ran over to the hatch on the roof and pulled it open, then spent half a minute coughing due to the foul smelling fumes that had come from the open hatch, before dropping down into what appeared to be the control room.

The first thing he noticed was the very size of it. The whole room would have to have been as large as, if not larger than his entire voot. The second thing he noticed were the creatures sitting in the chairs. He snorted at the sight; no wonder they had crashed. Just some stupid Worshians, probably carrying cargo they didn't even understand how to work. 'Hey! Hey you.' He pushed the first one, causing it to topple from its' seat in an ungainly heap.

Then he heard a laboured breathing coming from the other alien. 'He- help...'

Zim squinted at the creature. Couldn't they only breathe ammonia? 'Stupid Worshian.' Zim turned his back to study the controls. It seemed of a pretty standard design, so he didn't think he would be able to take anything useful from it. Maybe they were carrying something in their hold that would be useful.

'Cl-close the door.'

Zim looked up at the hatch, which was a good five feet above his head. He wouldn't be able to reach it even if he had wanted to. 'What were you carrying?'

'We... we crashed.'

'Yes, I know you crashed. What were you carrying?'

'There... there was a balloon thing...' He stopped to inhale the now poisonous air. 'We hit it... and crashed.'

'Yes, very good. But what were you carrying?' He looked at the alien, who didn't seem to be paying any attention to him. 'Hey! Hey! Look at me!' He pushed it, and it fell to the ground like the other one had. 'Peh. Dead.'

As Zim realised the uselessness of continuing on in the control room, he pushed open the door of the hold. In it were boxes and boxes of... well, Zim didn't know yet because he hadn't opened the boxes, but there had to be something useful.

Zim grabbed a crowbar that was placed near the door way and started at the crates. He tore open the first crate to find it stuffed with stuffed animals. The second and third crates were the same. The next ten crates he tore open contained equally useless junk.

Zim was starting to get worried as he ran to another lot of crates and started pulling them apart to discover shoes. While he did take a pair that was his size, none of what he found in that segment was useful. He could also hear the soldiers breaking their way into the ship. He ran to the furthest part of the hold, hoping something useful would be found there among the coils of wire and parts of ship bodies. Zim started tearing through the crates, finding nothing more useful than screws and circuit boards, a few of which he placed into his PAK.

After rummaging through easily opened crates containing parts and pieces he found something completely different. A smaller crate which wouldn't fold to his crowbar, and which had a locking mechanism attached to it. It was secured down to the floor with magnetic clamps, and looked to be holding something important. Zim wiped away the dust covering its label and read the destination it had been sent from: The Orobourous cluster. Zim grinned. That was one of the few places which contained the materials necessary for time travel.

Removing the grin from his face, Zim looked over the locking mechanism. It was just a simple twelve digit code, nothing that would slow him down for too long. He would surely be able to figure out the code needed to open the box in no time. After five minutes Zim got bored of typing in numbers, and instead broke the cover off the key pad and spent the next twenty minutes fiddling with wires until the lock clicked.

Then the crate opened, to reveal foamy black padding, which Zim quickly pulled out and tossed aside. In it he found several pieces of metal, joined together by crystal and wires. Zim dropped to his knees and reached in to the crate, carefully removing the fragile machinery. This would get him home. This would get him back to a less savage time. He re-wrapped it in the padding then placed it within his PAK, being careful not to bump it or drop it down into the depths.

While Zim was still kneeling in front of the crate he felt a torch beam shine into his eyes and heard the click of rifles. 'St- stay where you are!' called a rather nervous voice, belonging to a rather nervous soldier, holding a surprisingly steady torch. 'You're, uh, under arrest?'


	24. Chapter 24

Zim shivered in his cell. Though, really, cell was too grand a word for the store closet they had locked him into for want of an actual cell. He stared at the door, twitching whenever somebody walked too close to it. It bore the marks of the breakdown he had had when he was first locked in there. He had even been close to scratching through the solid pine door before he was caught and three soldiers had been forced to hold him down and cuff his hands behind his back.

He heard some footsteps come up to the door and stop right outside of it. He pushed himself further into the wall and stopped breathing, before the footsteps continued on and Zim scolded himself for being so scared. There wasn't anything these humans could do that would be worse than what he had already been through.

He froze as another pair of boots went past his cupboard, relaxing when they were out of range again. Of course he didn't have to worry about these humans. Not that he was worrying. There was even light coming in from under the door! These humans were nothing. He would get away from them as soon as he wanted to. And as soon as the handcuffs were taken off.

Zim sighed. He wished his PAK was still working properly. Stupid, backwards humans in stupid backwards deca- the footsteps continued on down the hallway and Zim started breathing again. Not that he was scared or anything. He would be back in his own time before, before... Before... He kicked the ground. It was impossible to think in this small, dark cupboard!

But he wasn't scared. No, of course not. And the walls definitely weren't closing in on him. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. He was fine. He wasn't scared. And he most definitely wasn't going to scream. Oh no.

Zim was focussing so hard on how not scared he was he didn't even notice the footsteps coming down the hall. Then the door opened and Zim screamed. 'No! NO!' He shrieked, trying to bring his arms up to protect his head, but just wrenching on his shoulders instead. Finally he managed to calm down slightly. He then coughed, looking slightly sheepish. 'What do you want?' Zim asked, trying to gain some control of the situation.

The human flicked through a few sheets of paper he had brought with him. 'We've learnt a bit about you, mister Zim Marcham.' He saw Zims eyes widen in slight surprise. 'Yes, we know about your "parents", and that you were brought over from Germany about 2 years ago. Disappeared last year and apparently to come to this small, New Mexico town. Now, then, Zim Marcham from Kentucky, we have some questions for you, and you are going to come with me and answer them.' He grabbed Zims wrist and pulled him out of the cupboard.

'What?' Zim tugged at his wrist, trying to escape from the humans grip. 'No, I don't need interrogating! I'm just a normal earth child! You just said I was a normal Earth child! I'm from Kentucky! Let me GO!' Zim managed to twist out of the humans grasp and got two steps before he was grabbed by his collar, and lifted off the ground, slamming him into the wall.

'Listen, we can make this a LOT harder on you than it has to be. Right now we have orders to look after you, and make sure you're not hurt too much. Those orders could change in an instant. You have no rights and we have no reason to even keep you alive. So if you want to survive, I suggest you cooperate. Now, do you understand?'

Zim nodded as best he could. Screw differences between countries! All humans were the same! Violent and savage. He was stuck here, with another psychotic army that would tear him apart and lock him up, and he would never escape it! He could see it again, the humans coming to tear him open. He would be shoved in the dark again, tortured and experimented on... there were hands grabbing at him! They were going to tear him apart here! Hands around his neck! What were they doing? He screamed and struggled against the constraining hands.

The human had put the panicking Irken down on the ground when he started to hyperventilate, loosening the collar on Zims shirt. He pulled back when the loudest scream he had ever heard came from the little alien's throat. He was about to order the soldiers who had come running over when the fuss broke out to drag Zim back to the small broom closet when he noticed his lips moving.

He leaned forwards, but couldn't understand what was being said. It seemed to be in some sort of German. He leaned backwards again and stood up, noticing that the already unreadable red eyes didn't seem to be focussing on him, or anything. 'Okay everybody, just keep it down and go back to your jobs. I'll sort it out.' He wondered if aliens could develop the same sort of mental problems as he had seen on displayed by returned soldiers. Whatever the creature was going through, it seemed to be very similar, though he was no expert on the matter.

He knelt down again and reached out to Zim, getting close but not touching. 'It's okay, we won't hurt you.'

After five minutes Zim finally got himself under control. He glared at the human who was holding a hand out to him like he was a strange dog. 'Get away from me' he growled, pushing himself away from the human and awkwardly managing to get himself up.

'Good that you're better. Now if you'll just come with me.' He reached out a hand again, which Zim flinched away from. 'Right, just this way then...'

Zim was fidgeting in his chair. He had been placed in this room one hour ago and then left. He wasn't worried though. Oh no, not at all. He wriggled around on the chair again, trying to find a comfortable spot. Stupid human chairs weren't PAK friendly. At least they had taken those STUPID handcuffs off. That made it slightly more bearable.

He tapped his fingers on the table, then kicked his legs for a bit. Then he sighed and decided to try the door again. It was still locked, just like the previous ten times he had checked.

Zim wandered around the room, stopping to tap at the partially see through mirror. There had been some humans sitting in the room on the other side since he came in, but he had long since given up on trying to get their attention. He saw them look at him, then nod to each other. Zim squinted as one of them walked out the door to the corridor. About thirty seconds later the door opened to the interrogation room, and in walked the human who had taken him here and a second, completely different one.

'Why don't you sit down?' The new human indicated the chair Zim had been sitting in previously. Zim sat down in it, while the other two took up places in the two chairs on the other side of the table.

'Now, you already know corporal Fredricks, and I'm Major Nielsen. We want to ask you a couple of questions.'

Zim leaned back and nodded. The humans were on the other side of the desk, so he would have plenty of time to get up to fight them if they tried to tear him apart.

'Let's get started simply. Where are you from?' Corporal Fredericks asked what he assumed would be a simple question to get an answer for.

'Eh? I'm from Kentucky. You know that.'

'Yes, but before Kentucky. Where did you come from originally?'

'Well, I was in Germany, and before that France.'

'Where were you from before France? What planet did you come from?'

'Planet? Zim is from Earth. Yep. France.'

'Of Course. Are there many people like you in France?'

'Eh? Oh, my skin condition. We don't like to talk about it. Because I'm French. Ye- Oui.'

Fredricks sighed. French aliens. That was obviously a dead end. 'Okay, then. You're French. Why did you come to this town. What are your plans?'

'Plans? Zim has no plans. I was, uh, looking for a job.'

'A job? So you travelled from Kentucky to New Mexico for a job at a convenience store?'

'Yes. The, uh, weather seemed nice out here.'

'The weather?' The corporal was not impressed by Zims story.

'Are you sure you didn't come for something else? The Visitors, perhaps?'

Zim glanced at the Major, wondering why he wasn't asking any questions. 'What visitors? Zim had no visitors.'

'The visitors! The Other aliens! The ones whose ship we found you in!'

'Oh, them? No, Zim had no knowledge they were coming. None at all.' He gave a small laugh, which tailed off at the looks he was getting from the humans.

'So, you just appeared there. By coinceidence.'

'Yes. yes, completely.'

The Major sighed. 'Look, this is getting us nowhere.' He turned back to Zim; 'Why did you come to this planet? And don't give me any French crap, we could easily have you biopsied to make sure you aren't human, so if you don't co-operate, we'll hand you over to the scientists. Now, why did you come here?' Both the soldiers gave Zim hard looks.

'Oh, uh, I crashed.'

'And were you planning on using the other ship to get away?'

'Yes! Yes, and if you let me go to the ship, I can be out of here by midnight.'

'So you were planning to use the crashed ship to leave the planet. How did you know it was here?'

'I didn't.'

'So you decided to come here, just for the weather, and wound up at the location of possibly the only downed spacecraft in the entire States, which happened to be not fifty miles from the town you just "happened" to find yourself in.'

'Yes. That's exactly it. Nothing else at all. You don't believe me?' Zim laughed again, to show that, no matter how unbelievable the statement, it was still true.

'Not really.' Neither the major nor the corporal were buying his story.

'Well, it's true. I just happened to be there.'

'Okay, lets say we believe that. What did you take from the cargo hold?'

'I didn't take anything!'

The corporal set a few photos on the table. 'You were found by this box. While it is only one of the many opened boxes in the craft, there was nothing inside it, and enough packing to suggest something was inside it. Did you take something out of it?'

Zim picked up the photos and looked at them. They were all photos of the crate he had taken the very vital piece of equipment out of. '...It was like that when I got there?'

'So you didn't get anything? Nothing at all?'

'No.'

'And if we looked into that thing on your back we wouldn't find anything at all?'

'WHAT! I mean, uh no. Nothing at all. You can't even open it.'

'So the soldier who said he saw you put something in there was lying?'

'Ye-' Zim was cut off by the Major turning to the Fredricks.

'Find somebody with a crowbar. We'll find out what's so important to lie about even if we have to pry that thing off his back.' Kenner got up to leave.

'NO!' Zim stood on his chair. 'No, don't! I'll tell you anything!' Kenner sat back down again.

'Sit down, Zim. What did you take out of the box?'

'Eh, uh...' Zim glanced around the room, hoping to find some inspiration for his lie. His eyes settled on the cup of coffee sitting in front of the men. 'A food machine!'

'A food machine?' The major asked in a way that suggested he didn't believe Zim. 'You went to all that trouble to steal a food machine?'

'Yes. Your human food is no good. Uh, not that I'm not a human, that is. I love French food. Cause I'm French. And from Earth.'

The interrogation continued on in this fashion for the next hour, with the soldiers retreading their questions, and Zim replying with unbelievable lies and the assurance that, yes, of course he's a human, just like all the other filthy hair-monsters on the planet.

Finally, the major turned to the corporal. 'Is the containment cell ready yet?'

He looked down at his watch. 'It should be.'

'Good. This is getting us nowhere. I think we can leave him to stew in there for a couple of days. That might make him a little more talkative' He left the room, sending in the soldier who had been standing outside the door to help the corporal lead Zim away.


	25. Chapter 25

My computer got a virus. Good news is I didn't lose anything. Even better news is that it made me get off my arse and post this! Enjoy

Zim lay on the bed in his cell. As far as these things went, it wasn't a bad cell. The door was very strong and the bed was lumpy, but it was brightly lit and large enough. Zim wriggled, trying to get into a more comfortable position as his PAK was starting to dig into his back. Finally getting into a comfortable position Zim stared at the wall. He was so close to the ship he could feel it! He grinned. He would steal the ship and be out of this stupid country, and this stupid time zone. The entire planet was just stupid!

Zim got up and started pacing/ kicking the room. He was so tired of the entire planet, and how he kept getting locked up by primitive humans! They weren't even half as capable as the Dib monster. Zim stopped. There was a name he hadn't thought of in a few years. The Dib creature wouldn't even have been a thought yet. He idly wondered for a few seconds whether or not he should kill the Dib monsters relations when he escaped, but decided he would much rather just go home. It wouldn't be too hard to kill him now Zim knew so much about the humans, having been stuck with them for around 30 years!

He punched the wall, that was 30 years he would never get back! 30 years in which he could have been helping the empire, or enslaving the humans, rather than being stuck on a pathetic lump of rock filled with stupidity and torturers! He screamed and started hitting the wall harder.

Zim collapsed down to the ground, exhausted by his previous outburst. In 30 years he could have taken over the whole stupid planet. He punched the wall one more time then sighed. At least the Dib wouldn't have gotten any stronger during that time, while Zim knew he had. It would now just be a matter of tearing the child's throat out, rather than playing with him as Zim had done previously. Why hadn't he just killed the creature from the start, anyway? Maybe he would even try reformatting GIR again. He smiled, remembering the stupid robots antics, and then the disaster that had been his previous attempt. Maybe not.

He was pulled out of his thoughts by a scraping sound at the door, as a hatch was pulled open and a plate slid through. 'Eh?' he asked, wandering over to it. Just some food. Human food. He recognised a sausage and what could possibly have been either mashed potatoes or solid, white water. There were also some over boiled grey peas. To wash it all down there was even a glass of water provided. Zim shuddered at the sight of the tray and took a few steps away from the poisonous variety. All humans just wanted him to die.

He wandered back over to the bed and lay down on the mattress, staring at the ceiling and thinking of nothing. Two hours later the lights went off.

Zims breath froze in his throat. The lights were off. The lights were off. Why had the lights suddenly gone off? He tried to breathe again, but the liGHTS WERE OFF! Were they going to come for him? WHEN were they going to come for him? He started to breathe again, fast and shallow, panicking at the lack of light and the way the darkness made him think about the other place. He felt a tingling in his regrown antennae, and flattened them against further assault. He rolled off the bed, not expecting the sudden drop to the floor that hadn't come in Germany, and ran over to the door.

At the door came a sudden shock as Zim put his bare foot into the cold watery potatoes and got the sausage burnt onto him. He screamed and fell back, cursing the humans and their food in a mix of French and Irken. When he had finished scraping the food off his foot and onto the concrete, he realised he had snapped out of the panic. He went back and sat on the bed, then started laughing. There was plenty of light in the room, seeping in from under the door. He just hadn't noticed it before.

Still giggling quietly Zim lay back and eventually fell into a light doze.

On the second day, Zim had managed to prepare himself for the shock of the lights going out, and so was able to remain calm in the few seconds it took for his eyes to adjust to the dark.

By the fifth day he wasn't even flinching when the lights went out, though was hoping that the humans would give him something to eat soon that didn't contain meat. Or was watery.

On day six scientists came into the room to "examine" him. He was fine with the measuring tapes, but when they started to bring out needles and scalpels he put up enough of a fight so that two guards were called in to restrain him. Once the scientists were finished, they left the room bruised and worrying about the way he hadn't been eating.

This worry was taken care of on day seven, when some of the humans came in and tried to force Zim to eat the food. He spent the rest of the day either vomiting or curled up in bed. On day eight he managed to get them to listen for long enough to tell them what he could eat.

On day eleven, after breakfast, Zim felt incredibly tired, then woke up in the evening feeling stiff and with a line of stitches running down his torso. For the rest of the days he refused to eat any food they brought for him.

On day sixteen he was taken out of the cell.

Zim trembled slightly as he was led handcuffed down a brightly lit corridor by a soldier. He knew he shouldn't be scared, because what else could the humans do to him? Pah, there was nothing these human could do that he hadn't lived through with the Nazi's. He kept trying to reassure himself, though the shaking kept getting worse and worse.

Eventually the soldier stopped him in the middle of the corridor. He knelt down to look Zim in the eye. Zim recognised him as one of the humans from earlier. 'Are you okay?'

'Yes. Of course Zim is okay. Let's just keep going!' Zim tugged away down the corridor.

The human shrugged and stood up, pulling Zim along after him as he went. 'It's not that far away, anyway.'

Zim tried to not let that sound foreboding.

When they finally stopped outside a closed door, and Zim was pushed inside, he nearly lost his balance at what he saw in there.

It was the ship. Inside the exceptionally large room, was the ship. Zim almost jumped in joy at the sight of it. He had spent the past week planning how to get out of that room so he could try and find the ship, and now the humans had brought him to it! Sure, he was in handcuffs, but those could be broken easily! He would be gone before the day was out!

Zim quickly stifled a giggle, receiving a look from his guard. 'We have brought you here to answer some questions about this spaceship, so don't get any funny ideas about escaping. While we don't want you to die, these men' he indicated the armed soldiers standing around the perimeter of the room, 'have been ordered to shoot to immobilise if you do anything we find suspicious.'

'Yes, yes.' Zim said, ignoring the human's threat and warning. 'When do I get on the ship?'

The human sighed. 'Follow me.' He led Zim to a small room off the side of the main hangar, where several white coated scientists were standing around, examining some of the data pads that had come from within the ship. There were soldiers on guard in the room as well. His guard took Zims handcuffs off. 'You will be staying with these scientists today, answering any questions they have about anything. If you don't co-operate with them, then you'll go back to your room for the next few days. The more you co-operate, the more you'll be allowed out of your room.'

Zim had already gone towards the scientists, after his immediate reaction of shrinking away from the men in the white coats. As soon as he got to them, the scientists started asking him questions, like "what is it used for?", "what material is it made of?", and "how does it turn on?' Zim answered the questions in as vague a way as possible, trying not to let the humans learn too much about the advanced technology. It wouldn't do for him to go back to his own time, only for the humans to have advanced so much that they would be harder to defeat. While he answered questions, he was also wondering how he could use this to his advantage.

The data pads themselves would be quite useless in any attempts he might make to escape his cell, or in his stealing of the ship and get away. He looked around, but decided that it would be impossible to get to the ship from where he was standing. It was too far away, and he would be shot five times before he even made it halfway across the floor. But hadn't the human said something about his co-operation allowing him to be let out of the cell more often? He just needed to co-operate with the humans, and seem friendly until they let their guards down enough for him to escape. He grinned. It was a brilliant plan, and one that could never fail. He turned back to the scientists, and threw himself into working with them, or bossing them around and showing off how much smarter than them he was.

It took two weeks. Two long weeks, where Zim answered questions and helped the scientists. Two weeks where Zim was glad of the patience he had acquired in the past years. Two weeks in which it was only the thought of eventually getting out that stopped him from driving a screwdriver into the smug face of the scientists who called him "little greenie". Two weeks of acting nice and "co-operating" before he was allowed to view one of the escape pods from the inside.

So, so close to victory. He laughed as he clanked the chains around his ankles, there to prevent him from running off, or something. He didn't know how the humans thought they may help, but he would still be able to fly the capsule even if they had him blindfolded and tied to a chair.

'What are you laughing about, little greenie?' The human grinned down at him.

'Nothing, uh, look at that! It's glowing!' He had found these humans to have the attention span of a smeetling. If you pointed out something new to them they would completely forget what they had just been doing.

'I wonder what it does.' Zim grinned at their stupidity. It was just a cup holder.

While the humans were gathered around the cup holder, marvelling at its glow and wondering as to its function, Zim was looking around the pod. It seemed to be a bog-standard escape pod, nothing more than a tin can with engines and a control panel. He wondered if it would even be able to make it to France, or if the rigours of atmosphere travel would be too much for it. He had been caught out that way before, trying to make it to the tallests in an escape pod. He had had a lot of time to think about his (admittedly few) mistakes, and that crash, along with getting too close to the STORD while it was in operation, was one he didn't want to repeat.

Zim looked over at the scientists as they made a louder fuss over something else, then turned back to studying the ship. Before he had time to actually figure out exactly _what_ the small sign on the wall underneath the ventilation shaft meant (stupid translator was starting to break down now, too), his shoulder was grabbed and he was pulled over to the control panel.

'Do you realise what this means?' The hand waved wildly about, nearly hitting another scientist who was happily fiddling with the parking gear. 'We have space travel! Think about everything we can do with this technology! With this machine and you we'll be able to-'

'Hey!' The scientist who had recently avoided a blow to the head shouted over the other one. 'We're not supposed to tell it.'

'Oh yeah.' The scientist let go of Zims shoulder, allowing him to take a closer look at the control panel. Apparently this wasn't just a standard issue escape pod. There were the tell tale signs of improvements made to allow it to fly under the radar and in the atmosphere. He bet that the floors and some of the wall panels were removable. You didn't get much for transporting goods, and smuggling was always a good way to get excess cash.

Zim grinned. At least now he knew he would be able to get to France in the escape pod. All he had to do now was get the humans to leave. Zim searched around for a reason for all the humans to leave the rather cramped ship, rather than just shouting "look out there!" and hoping they left, which he knew they wouldn't fall for again, not after they had ignored him the third time he had used it to try and steal some wires he had thought might be useful.

He started examining the controls. "Start", "Stop", uh, possibly that one was "fried egg lasers." Definitely something with lasers, anyway. Stupid translator, but lasers could definitely be useful. Oooooh, door control! Well, now he could lock them out. But to get them out so he can lock it. Hmmmm. Aaah, "Press for emergency air supply." Could humans breathe ammonia? They were hopelessly limited when it came to air sources so probably not. Of course, Zim couldn't either, but he had a respirator that was (hopefully) still working.

Zim pressed the button. The gas started leaking from the vents in the walls, thick and white and choking. Zim removed the respirator from his PAK and attached it to his face while the humans ran about and panicked, fleeing the suddenly murderous ship. Zim laughed as he watched them run out, then closed the door behind them. He quickly started up the engines, firing lasers randomly about the hangar, watching the humans run and hide from his almighty power! He would probably be able to cause more damage if he shot something that could blow up! Or, uh, he was trying to stop the humans from keeping hold of advanced technology! When he was satisfied with the amount of destruction he had caused, he fired straight at the roof, blasting an escape hole in the ceiling and leaving the hangar. He was about to head straight for the STORD when he paused. Maybe he could have a bit of fun while he was here. Make up for all that the humans had done to him, as well.

Zim grinned and stared at the humans running around frantically, eying them in the laser sights. Thank the Tallest for smugglers.


	26. Chapter 26

Zim hummed, looking over the now completely completed STORD. It was a thing of wonder that only HE could have created in such back water conditions. He stroked his hand along the on/off lever and pulled, the rest of the cellar getting lit up by the blue glowing swirl that appeared. Zim smirked, and inputted the temporal co-ordinates for his base into the data pad he had taken from America. On the screen of the second data pad he could see GIR, laughing and playing with a corpse dressed in a French military uniform.

Zim scratched his head. So _that's_ what he had been replaced with. Then, without one backwards look, Zim stepped into the light.

Outside, in the small garden Kurt stopped turning the dirt over with his fork. Something was wrong... Then the house collapsed into the cellar. Maybe it was about time to sell up and go over to America. Apparently his sister was married now, to a boy with the most adorable little spike of hair.

Zim coughed as he reappeared in the lab. 'Master! Master! I was so worried about you! You were gone for so long! I was looking everywhere!'

'Do not lie to me, GIR!' Zim stared around at the lab. It was so messy. 'Now clean this up! I need to go and rest.' And so saying, he stumbled off to find his recharging station. He could always call the Tallests later.


End file.
